Our History

For 20 years, the Alliance Community Assistance Ministries, Inc. (ACAM) has assisted families within the Greater Houston region during economic downturn, natural disasters, medical bankruptcy, and other community and family crises. ACAM is a 501(c)(3) public charity and management support organization that assists a network of partner organizations through high-impact collaboration, training, and management support services as they provide opportunities for families and individuals to meet and rise above their basic needs.

ACAM was first established in 2004 as a project called ZCAM with funds from local philanthropic organizations. Our mission has strategically evolved as the organization has developed. What began as a management support pilot with one staff person and a $600,000 budget became in 2011 a 501(c)3 nonprofit with capacity building as the chief focus. By 2013, collaborative initiatives had become the bedrock for building the network’s collective capacity, and in 2020, ACAM doubled staff size and budget in response to the community need created by COVID-19. Today with 5.5 staff, 2 AmeriCorps VISTA service members, 11 contract staff, and a $3.3M budget, ACAM advances collaboration to create community-wide solutions for thriving nonprofits, neighborhoods, and families.

ACAM is an innovative, connected network of assistance organizations focused on ensuring that families in need have a path to stability, health, and wealth. With a reputation for transparency and high performance, ACAM develops initiatives that foster evaluation and build a learning community; aligns and garners talent and resources to support the expanding reach of the network; generates technology and data-driven solutions with the network; strategically supports network partners who are premier and expert providers of basic needs and homelessness prevention services; and connects partners to other sectors critical to the performance of the safety net.

ACAM engages with nonprofits, community organizations, and governmental agencies on various levels. Annually the 14 core partners of the network serve an average of 280,000 unduplicated clients with more than 9 million units of service across 160 different types of services. These services include providing basic needs (food, clothing), housing stability, adult education, financial literacy training, medical screenings/immunizations, counseling, and much more. ACAM also helps community assistance ministries that do not yet meet core partner requirements to build capacity (advancement partners), offers nonprofits easy, cost-effective access to training and networking (limited partners), and engages a wide variety of other organizations who provide basic needs services (community partners).