Community Care Fund

For Donors

If therapy has helped you in your own life, you’re invited to help make that support available to someone else.

The Community Care Fund helps reduce financial barriers to mental health care by covering part or all of the cost of services for people who otherwise wouldn’t be able to afford them.

Funds can be used for:

Therapy and counseling
Trauma-focused and longer-term psychotherapy
Psychological testing and assessment
Other clinically necessary mental health services through The Pine Center or with licensed providers across North and South Carolina

Funds are not required to be used only at The Pine Center. Funds can be used with any licensed mental health provider in North or South Carolina. 100% of all contributed funds will be redistributed to the community.

Why this matters

A lot of people who want therapy simply can’t afford it consistently.

It’s not just the cost of one session. It’s the ongoing reality of the cost of weekly or biweekly appointments, insurance gaps, deductibles, time off work, and income that doesn’t stretch far enough to cover long-term care.

On top of that, finding a therapist can take time. Waitlists are long. Good fits can be hard to find. And for many people, the systems involved in getting care can feel complicated or exhausting to navigate.

When cost gets in the way, care often gets delayed, reduced, or stopped altogether. For people dealing with trauma, chronic stress, or ongoing life instability, that interruption can really matter.

This fund exists to soften that barrier wherever we can.

How it works

People donate whatever amount feels right for them
That money goes directly toward mental health services and adjacent care, e.g., psychological testing, evaluations, etc., for clients who need support
When funds are available, services can be partially or fully covered

Put simply: it helps someone get care they wouldn’t otherwise be able to afford.

This doesn’t fix the larger problems in the mental health system. But it does make care more accessible in real, immediate ways while we work on creating larger systemic change.

Why the fund exists

Mental health care isn’t equally accessible, even when the need is very real.

Whether someone can get support often depends on things like income, insurance coverage, where they live, and how easy it is to navigate the system, not just whether they actually need help.

Even “sliding scale” spots are limited, and they don’t always meet the level of need in the community. That leaves a lot of people stuck between full-cost care and no care at all.

This fund is one way of bridging that gap by pooling community resources to help cover the cost of care when finances would otherwise make it out of reach.

For Recipients

We know asking for financial help can feel uncomfortable or complicated.

This fund is here to make that part easier.

If you need support accessing therapy or other mental health services, you can request help through the Community Care Fund. No long forms. No need to explain your situation in detail.

The belief behind this is simple: access to mental health care shouldn’t depend on how well someone can justify needing it.

How to request support

Email: kaci@thepinecenter.com
Subject line: Community Care Fund

We’ll let you know what support is currently available and can add you to a waitlist if funds are temporarily limited.

The Community Care Fund is part of The Pine Center’s Accessible Care Initiative and is supported directly by community donations.

Donate to Community Care Fund

Waitlist for Funding

Grounded in Ethics

The Community Care Fund aligns with the American Counseling Association (ACA) ethical framework, particularly in relation to access, justice, and advocacy in clinical practice.

Key ethical principles include:

Justice: Counselors are ethically called to work toward equitable access to services and to reduce barriers to care. This fund operationalizes that principle by directly addressing financial barriers to treatment access.
Beneficence and nonmaleficence: Ethical practice requires promoting client well-being and reducing foreseeable harm. When cost prevents access to clinically indicated services, it can function as a structural barrier to care. The fund is one mechanism for reducing that harm when clinically appropriate.
Fidelity and responsibility: Mental health professionals are expected to uphold responsibility to clients and communities. Expanding access through financial support structures reflects that responsibility beyond the individual session level.
Advocacy: The ACA recognizes advocacy as an integral part of counseling practice. Supporting financial access to care is one concrete form of advocacy within clinical systems.

The fund is a structural support that expands available options for ethically indicated care.