By: Lydia Crawley
The Parsons Advocate
Margot Evick of the Randolph-Tucker Child Advocacy Center spoke to the Tucker County Commission March 12th about what your organization had done in Tucker County over the past year and what their goals for the future were. “The Child Advocacy Center works with community partners to promote healing and justice for victims of abuse and neglect and drug endangerment and all of those things,” Evick said.
Evick said that the CAC has been working with CASA for Kids since 2024 and look forward to continuing to work with the organization as they expand in Tucker County. “We look forward to being able to strengthen our partnership with CASA,” Evick said. “We are so excited to have them.”
According to Evick, case numbers were down in Tucker County for Fiscal Year 2024. “So last year our numbers were down all the way across the board,” Evick said. “From a hundred and fifty some the prior year to 89 last year in fiscal year 2024.”
Numbers were up eight percent across the State, but numbers in Tucker and Randolph Counties were down, according to Evick. As a result, Evick said her organization has met individually with their Child Protective Service workers on the issue. “There’s a lot of reason for that,” Evick said. “The State, the entire State of West Virginia, did see an eight percent increase in children being served, but for whatever reason, Randolph and Tucker Counties, the numbers did not match up.”
Tucker County Commission President Mike Rosenau said he felt that CPS in the area were not doing the job they should and thought Tucker County was falling through the cracks. “In my opinion, they are just not doing their job in Tucker County,” Rosenau said. “I have talked on the State level and the thing that I get is, well we just don’t have the workers. Well, we have children in Tucker County that need protected.”
Evick said she has met with the CPS workers and they assure her they are doing the best job they can for the County, but covering Tucker County is a challenge. “I have driven over to Mineral County and met with them individually and they assure me they are doing the best that they can,” Evick said. “But yet I talk to my fellow directors and other CAC’s which actually share the same CPS workers…but there’s quite a few counties that they are covering so Tucker County to come over here has been a challenge for them.”
Evick said she stays in contact with Tucker County Prosecuting Attorney Savannah Hull Wilkins on the issue. “Of course Savannah Wilkins and I are in constant contact to make sure that is happening,” Evick said. “We have another meeting to see what are we going to do because this is a problem.”
Rosenau said that Tucker County children are just as important as children in other areas of the State and doesn’t want them to be left behind because of where they live. “The little county, tucked away over in the mountains, I don’t have time to do that,” Rosenau said. “I can just go down the street and take care of children right here. Well, our children are just as important as every child. So that’s why you’ll see me get a little bit, I don’t know, get a little bit loud, passionate. We have to be or we just get drownded out.”
Evick said that Tucker County cases were seen due to efforts of law enforcement, prosecutors and school counselors. “The numbers that did come through Tucker County, because of law enforcement and prosecution, stayed up,” Evick said. “But law enforcement, because school counselors call in constantly, making sure, hey this happening. They call us directly. We were able to catch a lot, make sure a lot of those kids were seen in this area.”
Rosenau also attributed school resource officers to the drop in Tucker County cases. “We have school resource officers now,” Rosenau said. “That may make a difference in our numbers going down.”
Evick also said that the school resource officers have had a positive impact on children since their adoption. “We have seen such a positive impact for children since those PRO officers have been available for children,” Evick said.
Rosenau attributed Tucker County’s success to teamwork. “We talk about a Team in Tucker County,” Rosenau said. “We have the School Resource Officers and we have a Prosecutor now that does not hesitate to prosecute and I appreciate that, especially when it comes to children. So you do something wrong in Tucker County and it has something to do with a child, you’re going to jail.”
In all, Tucker County saw 90 forensic interviews, with 10 of those children receiving medical care, 36 of those children referred and started counseling, 1,391 children receiving prevention, 953 of those children receiving advocacy services with a majority of children for sexual abuse with the remainder followed by physical abuse, according to Evick. “Drug endangerment, the number of children that we saw doubled,” Evick said. “That was significant. We had the highest number of increase for West Virginia.”
Evick said that Tucker County has seen 19 cases so far since January with only a couple more months in the fiscal year. “Our numbers since January, Randolph-Tucker CAC in total has only seen 67 kids,” Evick said. “But 19 of them have been through Tucker County. Sometimes we see 20 to 25 kids total for Tucker County for the year,” Evick said. “So to have 19 already and we’ve only got a couple more months of the year. That’s good. I’m comfortable with that, but I still need that CPS response to be stronger.”
The CAC also has been completing their yearly body safety curriculum in the County schools. This year, Evick said they have been in talks with Mountain Laurel School about beginning the program there. Rosenau asked about what could be done to bring the curriculum to home schooled children in the area. “That is a topic of discussion currently,” Evick said. “It has been the last few years. How do we reach these children, especially with the increase in the number of kids that are staying home to be schooled. What are we supposed to do?”
Evick said the topic has been a state-wide discussion among CAC’s, one without a simple answer. “That is a state-wide conversation right now to try and figure out how we are getting this in because we know it is mandated that these children that are in public school get sexual abuse prevention curriculum every year. We haven’t figured that out yet,” Evick said.
Evick said many homeschooling parents are doing a good job, but she worries there are those children that “nobody has eyes on.” Evick said that perhaps there would be a way to enlist pediatricians to assist in efforts, as they are mandatory reporters. “Do we meet with the pediatricians to really dig into what signs to look for in that small amount of time they are with them so they as mandatory reporters can make sure they are connecting or giving the parents that prevention information to share with them?” Evick said.
Rosenau said that he is not against homeschooling, only that he doesn’t want to see any child “fall through the cracks.” “I’m not saying anything negative at all about homeschooling, but I want all children because its not just the sexual abuse that could happen while they are homeschooling, but somewhere else,” Rosenau said. “So if they have a little bit of knowledge on where to go, what to do if that happens. You know, I don’t want any child to fall through the cracks.”
Rosenau offered that if Evick required a letter of support to assist with efforts at the State level, the County Commission would be happy to write one for her. “If with your conversations at the State level, if there’s are any letters of support that you need from a County Commission, we’d be glad to write that letter, if it would help you, just to try to get their attention,” Rosenau said.
In a motion made by Rosenau, the Commission approved a funding request by the CAC for $15,000. Included in the motion was the free use of office space supplied by the County.
Tickets for this year’s Champions for Children April fundraiser are on sale, according to Evick and can be purchased through the organization’s website https://rtcac.org.
