For the past four decades, a nonprofit organization has been helping care for Whidbey infants and toddlers with developmental delays and disabilities.

Formerly known as the Toddler Learning Center, Taking Steps Together served 418 families on the island in 2024 with in-home visits. Physical, occupational and speech therapists, along with other providers, lend support to families in need.

This year, Steps is celebrating its 40th anniversary. To kick things off, staff are planning a sing-along fundraiser at The Clyde Theatre in Langley at 6 p.m. on Thursday, April 17. Lyrics will appear on screen for the hit film “The Greatest Showman.” Oak Harbor resident Heather Good, the host for the evening, will help warm up vocal cords and teach some dance moves. Fancy costumes are encouraged. Tickets cost $30 each, or $50 for two and can be purchased online at takingstepstogether.org.

“I’m hoping that everybody will sing at the top of their lungs,” Development Director Heather Tenore said

Executive Director Rene Denman’s first introduction to Steps came 22 years ago, when her infant daughter had a feeding tube and underwent some significant surgeries in her young lifetime.

“My daughter was born, I needed the services, the services were there,” Denman said. “They pretty much, in my opinion, changed the quality of life for my daughter and our whole family.”

Denman’s story is not uncommon in the community.

“Unless you need us, you’re not aware that we exist as a nonprofit on the island,” she said.

Tenore voiced a similar sentiment.

“If someone hasn’t had a kiddo come through our program, they don’t realize that we’re not just Oak Harbor, that we serve the whole island, that we’ve been here for 40 years and that we’re a nonprofit,” she said.

At a time when the future of federal funding is up in the air, the community’s support is needed more than ever.

“For right now we’re in wait and see mode,” Tenore said. “We just have to keep moving forward.”

Steps was founded in 1985 by Carrolle Flanagan, who launched Toddler Learning Center in the basement of the Nazarene Church in Oak Harbor. Three years later, staff began conducting in-home visits for South Whidbey residents. By 1990, construction started on the Toddler Learning Center’s new home on the Skagit Valley College Campus.

Whidbey Island school districts contracted with the organization in 1995 to provide services for kids ages 0 to 3 with support from state special education funding and guidance from a federal program. Services were extended to the San Juan Islands in 2019, and to Anacortes in 2023, where no other assistance currently exists for infants and toddlers with developmental delays and disabilities.

The name change, from Toddler Learning Center to Taking Steps Together, occurred in 2023. Denman explained that the organization hasn’t had a facility where caregivers can bring kids for several years now — all services currently occur in the home.

In the past few years Steps has launched three new specialties that include a feeding team to support infants and toddlers with oral, feeding and nutrition issues; Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health services to support the social and emotional growth of children through age 5; and Applied Behavior Analysis services for children from birth to entering kindergarten with autism.

Of the more than 500 families served on a yearly basis on Whidbey, in Anacortes and the San Juans, 42% are considered low-income, and on average, 37% are Medicaid families, living at or below federal poverty levels. About half of referrals are military families, due to Whidbey Island Naval Air Station in Oak Harbor.

Tenore and Denman both agreed that Oak Harbor leverages Steps’ ability to serve families beyond North Whidbey. One of the challenges is making other areas, such as South Whidbey, aware of the organization’s work. Steps served 43 South Whidbey families last year.

Another challenge, Denman said, is attracting providers to work in a rural environment. Tenore said cancellations of ferry sailings out to the San Juan Islands have presented another barrier for providers.

In the past 10 years, Denman has seen a big change in how children are evaluated, which used to be specific to certain domains such as a delay in speech that required a speech evaluation. Now, Steps takes a holistic approach, performing an assessment that looks at full development, social, emotional and early childhood mental health.

Tenore said Steps will continue to celebrate its 40th anniversary with other events later this year.

(Photo provided by Steps) By 1990, construction started on the Toddler Learning Center’s new home on the Skagit Valley College Campus.

(Photo provided by Steps) Founder Carrolle Flanagan was the first executive director of the Toddler Learning Center, which is known today as Steps.

(Photo provided by Steps) A physical therapist works with a child during a home visit.