Photo submitted to the Times Observer Pictured is Melissa Mclean and the Warren County Children’s Advocacy Center’s facility dog, Tiger.

No one likes to think about child sexual abuse, but the reality is that it’s happening, and it’s happening in Warren County.

“People have to accept that this exists in Warren. There is charm to a small town, and ignoring it doesn’t make it go away. Giving it attention doesn’t make false reports.” said Melissa Mclean, executive director and forensic interviewer at the Warren County Children’s Advocacy Center.

Mclean has done over 300 interviews with children since she started at WCCAC in 2019. She stresses that her job is to interview children, to make them feel comfortable to share what has happened to them.

The Children’s Advocacy Center is a maze of tiny, efficient rooms, set up behind a locked steel door where you have to be buzzed in. The forensic interview takes place in a small room set up more like a living room, with cozy couches, a lamp and a chubby therapy dog named Tiger. There, Mclean asks the children, mostly aged 18 and under, about what happened to them. Cameras record the scene from multiple angles, with the children’s full knowledge. The recording of the interview will go to the District Attorney and law enforcement. Eventually, it could be the main piece of evidence in a court case.

Next door to the interview room is a long, narrow room full of monitors and lined with big office chairs. This is where the footage is viewed and recorded. While WCCAC is mostly used for children, sometimes others need their services as well.

“I give law enforcement a lot of credit for bringing young adults here,” said Mclean. “An 18 or 19 year old victim is often more likely to open up in this space than in a police station, even if they are technically an adult.”

Mclean also sometimes works with older adults with cognitive issues, non-verbal adults or adults with disabilities.

Around the corner from the room full of TV monitors is a family waiting room. It looks like most waiting rooms that involve children, with books, magazines and toys arranged around child-resistant furniture. One unique feature in the corner is a play wooden courtroom full of wooden lawyers, judges and jurors.

“There is a man who makes these for every Children’s Advocacy Center” Mclean said “and the Toy Shoppe in North Warren made the judge and jury for us.”

To get to the waiting room, you pass a desk tucked into a corner of the hallway belonging to Katelyn Hecei, WCCAC family advocate. While the child is being interviewed, Hecei works with the family to arrange counseling and help the family figure out the next best steps, as well as the services that are available to them, including a safety plan.

Mclean conducted 70 interviews last year, and 30 so far this year. Those numbers may sound low, but that’s more than one case every week of a child being sexually abused in Warren County, and most children don’t come out right away about the issue.

“Delayed disclosure is more normal for children.” Mclean said. “Nine out of ten children won’t say anything right away. There are a variety of reasons for that. Some children don’t know that what is happening to them isn’t normal. Plus, kids are smart. They inherently want to protect parents and, if that person provides rent and food, they will protect the family unit.”

While the Warren County Children’s Advocacy Center has only been around a few years, childhood sexual abuse is not new. According to Mclean, it is rare for her to set up a table at a community event and not have someone come up and tell her that they wished WCCAC had been around when they were being abused as a child.

“It;s not that police and district attorneys were not trying or caring, but society systems were not in place to help as much back then.” Mclean said.

The Warren County Children’s Advocacy Center works hard to create a safe place for children to talk about what may be one of the worst things that will ever happen to them and find help for them and their family to take the next steps toward healing.

They operate on a shoestring budget. The two-person staff works hard to bring help, hope, healing and, sometimes, justice to the most vulnerable in Warren, but have to spend a lot of time raising money to keep their doors open.

There are few parts of WCCAC that the average person will ever see. Warren is a small community, and the staff is protective of their clients and the privacy of the victims and families of victims. Rumors will not start there. Tiger, their service dog, is the most publicly visible part of their organization, and he doesn’t talk about what he hears.

Mclean has a lot more slashes in her title than it first appeared. She is executive director/forensic interviewer/marketing director/event director/grant writer/fundraising coordinator/social media coordinator/service dog handler. Hecei is coordinating a “It takes a Village 5k” at Chapman Dam State Park on July 26, in addition to working with families in need. Together, they are working hard to carve out a safe place for children to get help, as well as keep the funding flowing for that space.

To support the Warren County Children’s Advocacy Center visit warrencac.org and click on the donate button in the upper right. To sign up for the It takes a village 5k, visit charity.pledgeit.org/c/XtVXaEJ9sf.