With Child Abuse and Neglect Awareness Month nearing in April, county DFCS leaders learned that Madison County had 344 abuse and neglect reports in fiscal year 2009, 68 fewer than 2008.
“And we’re on kind of a downward trend with the number of reports that we get, because we’ve been handling so many of the referrals through our diversion or family support services program which don’t actually get an investigation,” Madison County DFCS director Lisa Plank told the DFCS board this past Friday.
Plank explained that many of the calls in past years were families that simply needed help. Now those families are provided support services.
Madison County DFCS saves investigations for “the most serious of the calls.”
Because only these most serious instances are being investigated, the substantiation rate of abuse and neglect is now higher.
“If we have fewer that we’re investigating, and we’re investigating the most serious of allegations, then we’re going to have more that are actually substantiated,” Plank said.
Plank also discussed the department’s plans for prevention month in April.
Madison County will again hang children’s T-shirts on a clothesline in front of the old courthouse as a symbolic reminder of child abuse and neglect in the county.
Madison County DFCS had previously displayed “Pinwheels for Prevention” but thought the t-shirts served as a more striking image for motorists passing around Danielsville’s square.
Plank also makes herself available to churches and schools to speak on the subject as part of the prevention and awareness process.
“What I like to focus on more is what people can do to prevent child abuse and, specifically, what people do every day that helps prevent child abuse and neglect,” Plank said.
Whether it’s donating to the food bank or handing down clothes to a family in need, it all helps prevent child abuse and neglect in Madison County, Plank said.
“I like making people feel like they’re already doing something,” Plank said. “Because I think people do more than they realize they do.”
Madison County DFCS is also interested in becoming a t-shirt sponsor for the April 17 Prevent Child Abuse Athens Walk.
Prevent Child Abuse Athens also serves Madison County.
