Anna Palmer
Member, Board of Directors

Anna Palmer's work in trauma-informed care started with a challenge. While on staff at her church, she attended a meeting hosted by the Louisiana Department of Children and Family Services about the shortage of foster families in the state. She left convinced the faith community needed to step up. In 2013, she helped turn an existing church-based organization into Crossroads Louisiana, shifting its focus to recruiting, training, and supporting foster families through local churches.

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As Executive Director, Palmer built Crossroads Louisiana around the idea that families caring for kids from hard places shouldn't have to do it alone. Under her leadership, the organization has trained caregivers in Trust-Based Relational Intervention® (TBRI®) and partnered with dozens of churches, walking alongside hundreds of foster families along the way.

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The belief that healing happens through relationship rather than isolation, is something HJI holds as well. Palmer's experience training caregivers to meet trauma with connection instead of control brings real value to HJI's work bringing trauma-informed care into correctional settings, where people healing from hard places need the same things.