When Brianna “Bri” Taylor joined the Piedmont CASA staff as a supervisor in July 2026, she brought Culpeper’s CASA program with her.
That’s because People Incorporated of Virginia (PIOV), longtime funders of Culpeper’s program, had withdrawn its financial support. When Bri, who had been program coordinator for Culpeper’s program since 2019, learned of the upcoming change, she reached out to Piedmont CASA President and CEO Kate Duvall to see if Piedmont CASA was interested in expanding further.
Bri’s proposal made good sense since Culpeper’s program, like Piedmont CASA, is part of Virginia’s 16th Judicial District. Over the past few years, Piedmont CASA had expanded its reach into Fluvanna and Madison counties, with plans to add Orange County, too. These counties are all part of the district.
Not surprisingly, Kate was receptive to Bri’s outreach. It took more than a year until all of the details were ironed out, but Culpeper became part of Piedmont CASA July 1.
“This wouldn’t have been possible if Bri hadn’t been part of the plan,” says Piedmont CASA President and CEO Kate Duvall. “I’m certain that Bri’s experience leading the Culpeper program and her relationships with the professionals and community in Culpeper will help to smooth this transition.”
“Kate was a huge support system through it all,” Bri recalls. “The new arrangement provides more consistency for the 16th Judicial District and recognizes the efforts of the Culpeper volunteers who advocate for the region’s children in foster care.”
It also allows Bri to continue doing work that she has loved for nearly a decade. As an undergraduate sociology major at Shenandoah University, she followed the advice of a friend whose father was a CASA advocate in Prince William County and pursued CASA volunteer training. “Court Appointed Special Advocates Children’s Intervention Services, in Manassas, was where I completed my senior internship project through Shenandoah University,” she says.
After college, she worked briefly as a Child Protective Services worker trainee in West Virginia, and then joined the Rappahannock Rapidan Community Services Board staff as a support coordinator for adults with serious mental illness. Just nine months later, she answered CASA’s call. She began working for PIOV, which supported not only Culpeper, but also a program serving Smyth and Washington counties as well as the city of Bristol, all in Virginia’s 28th Judicial District. She also earned an MA in human services counseling and parent and child/adolescent development from Liberty University. “I found that I really missed working with kids,” she reports.
As program coordinator, Bri managed all aspects of the PIOV-supported CASA programs in Culpeper and Southwest Virginia. In addition to training and supervising advocates, she attended judicial hearings, trainings, and conferences, and recruited volunteers. She was also responsible for partner agreements, court reporting, program performance, data collection, and program evaluation.
Bri’s new role as a supervisor may seem simpler than her old job, but she says there is much to learn. She’s attending select segments of Piedmont CASA’s summertime advocate training session — court report writing will be one of them — and she brings her full Culpeper supervisory caseload with her. She also plans to supervise all new Madison County cases.
“I expect I’ll be in Charlottesville a couple of times a month,” says Bri, who lives in Culpeper County with her husband, Jon, and the couple’s three-year-old son. “Piedmont CASA is one of the larger programs in the state, and there are so many members of the CASA team to help me that I look forward to focusing more time on my caseload.”
