Hands Around the Courthouse event April 19 to raise awareness about child abuse, prevention

DIXON — The Hands Around the Courthouse Child Abuse Awareness event will begin at noon Friday, April 19, on the Old Lee County Courthouse lawn.

The child abuse awareness event will feature local officials, survivors and advocates speaking about how the community can help prevent and identify child abuse and how to advocate for survivors. The event is taking place during April’s annual observance of National Child Abuse Prevention Month.

Dixon Mayor Glen Hughes advocated for the community to attend the event during a council meeting earlier this month, during which he read a proclamation observing April as National Child Abuse Prevention Month. The proclamation states that every child deserves to grow up in a nurturing environment, free of abuse, neglect, violence or endangerment of any kind and that statistics of children who are abused and neglected escalate each year. Last year, Illinois had 36,146 indicated cases, he said.

He called upon all residents to increase their participation in efforts to prevent child abuse to strengthen the communities where they live. He said effective child abuse prevention and advocacy programs succeed because of partnerships created among courts, social service agencies, schools, religious organizations, local governments, law enforcement and the business community. He also pointed to the effectiveness of work being done by the Shining Star Children’s Advocacy Center, located in Dixon, and the Court-Appointed Special Advocates [CASA] program to provide services to children and families affected by abuse and to heighten awareness.

Hughes said that in fiscal 2023, Shining Star forensically interviewed 219 children in Lee and Ogle counties and 150 children and caregivers received mental health services. Hughes, who has been a CASA advocate for several years and serves on its board, said that in 2023, CASA served 117 children in 67 cases utilizing 36 volunteers.

Of the volunteers, he said, “I would have to say that’s not sufficient to actually cover those cases and we had cooperation of supervisors and executives within CASA assisting in monitoring those cases but that’s 117 children specifically in the courts in the 15th Circuit Court District.” The 15th Circuit includes Lee, Ogle and Carroll counties, he said.

The mission of Shining Star Children’s Advocacy Center is to transform victims of child abuse into survivors and to reduce the trauma of child abuse through identification, offender accountability, advocacy, counseling and education in an effort to eliminate child abuse.

According to its website, Shining Star Children’s Advocacy Center since 2002 has been providing services for child abuse victims and their families. The purpose of the program is to provide forensic interviewing, case management and follow-through, and coordinated services to child victims of sexual and physical abuse and their non-offending family members in Lee and Ogle counties.

“Additionally, we seek to minimize the trauma experienced by child victims by providing a comfortable and child-friendly environment for the interview and investigations of child abuse crimes,” the website states.

The center provides forensic interviewing and advocacy, mental health services and forensic medical examinations, if needed. The organization has conducted over 1,550 forensic interviews since it opened in 2002, according to its website.

“Shining Star Children’s Advocacy Center is an integral part of facilitating the coordination of a multidisciplinary team consisting of professionals from Lee and Ogle county law enforcement, state’s attorneys, the Department of Children and Family Services, and mental and medical health providers,” the website states. “The collaboration that takes place among these agencies provides an opportunity to share knowledge and expertise pertaining to issues surrounding investigations and the needs of children and their non-offending family members.”