The fund’s goal is “to support every baby born and child raised in King County to be happy, healthy, safe, and thriving.” Best Starts for Kids provides comprehensive support from prenatal development through young adulthood and supports eight different investment areas: 

1. Child Care: Improves the well-being of families, children, and child care workers by investing in child care subsidies and testing the benefits of increasing wages in child care workers.
2. Investing Early: Prenatal–5: Builds a robust system of programs for pregnant people, babies, young children, and their families and caregivers, meeting them where they are: at home, in the community, and wherever children receive care.
3. Sustain the Gain: 5–24: Provides school- and community-based opportunities for children and young people to enhance their social-emotional development and mental well-being through connection with peers and supportive adults in and out of school. 
4. Youth and Family Homelessness Prevention Initiative: Provides rent assistance and case management to prevent families and young people from losing stable housing.
5. Communities of Opportunity: Invests in communities by strengthening partnerships, sharing knowledge, and building capacity in communities to change systems and policies to create fair and lasting conditions in housing, health, and economic opportunities for children and their families.
6. Capital Projects: Improves and creates physical community spaces to equitably expand access to high-quality programs and services for children, young people, and families. 
7. Technical Assistance and Capacity Building: Offers no-cost assistance to community organizations applying for Best Starts funding and strengthens funded partners’ organizations and programs.
8. Data and Evaluation: Invests in trained staff, data systems, external evaluators, and data collection and reporting assistance for providers.
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In 2024, Best Starts for Kids partnered with 365 community-based organizations operating 609 programs to directly serve 169,340 individuals and reach over 525,954 children, young people, families, providers, and community members across King County. Other 2024 impact highlights include the following:

• 87% of parents who received the Best Starts’ Child Care Subsidy reported a positive change in their career or education. 
• 99% of caregivers served through Home-Based Services had increased knowledge of parenting and child development.
• 94% of youth leaders in the Community Well-being Initiative knew how to access mental health supports.
• 80% of youth participating in Expanded Learning programs gained new skills.
• Best Starts connected 1234 community organizations to capacity-building services providing more than 8,700 hours of support.