Curry Café: How Wally’s House Child Advocacy Center Serves Curry County’s Kids

In this episode of Curry Café, hosts Ray Gary and Michael Gorse talk with Jackie Antunes, executive director of Wally’s House, a child advocacy center in Curry County. Jackie details the center’s comprehensive services for children who have experienced trauma, including forensic interviews, advocacy, trauma-focused therapy, medical exams, and prevention education for adults. The discussion […]

Episode Transcript

(00:02):
Hello, KCIW listeners, and welcome to Curry Cafe,
where we put together a panel of volunteers
and guests who discuss various topics from whimsical
and fun to more serious subjects.
Well, that was the beautiful,
melodious voice

(00:22):
of Rick McNamer, who, unfortunately,
when you hear that can't open, it means
he's not here today. The poor guy's having
a bit sniffles
and is under the weather. And so we,
we miss you. We completely miss you, Rick.
But we certainly have the famous radio personality,
Ray Gary,
with Curry Cafe. And tell us about the

(00:45):
show today. Okay. But before I I get
into this show, I just wanna mention one
quick thing very quickly.
There is a lot going on in the
country right now. We may be in one
of the most serious situations we've been in
maybe even since the revolutionary war. So if
you're one of these people who does not
pay attention to politics or watch the news,

(01:07):
please start doing that now. And if you
are,
have a friend like that, so I don't
read paper
or watch the news, tell them they better
start paying attention. It's really getting very, very
serious.
So I will then turn it over to
our our guest today who will tell you
who she is and what she's gonna talk
about.

(01:28):
Good afternoon. I'm Jackie Antunes.
I am the executive director of our county's
child advocacy center, Wally's House.
And
I am here at Ray's invitation
to
answer questions,
to talk about what we do, and
how we started, where we're going, how whatever

(01:48):
you guys wanna know about Wally's House.
I'm
here to answer questions and
And to help,
the questions that we want to answer, you
can text us at (541)
661-4098.
(541)
661-4098.

(02:10):
Now Wally's House is
tell me about Wally's House. So Wally's House
is
one of 24
child advocacy centers in the state of Oregon
and the only one in Curry County.
So,
we
do,
forensic interviews. We provide advocacy.

(02:31):
We do medical exams that are called a
Carly's Law exam.
We also provide mental health for those that
come through
our facility that have,
made a disclosure. Our therapist is trained in
trauma focused cognitive behavior therapy.
We have also added a prevention specialist, so

(02:53):
we are starting to,
accept invitations
to present to
adults
right now to
teach them how to intervene
and,
identify when there might be some kind of
abuse going on
and,
prevent it. So we have we have that.

(03:13):
We're also currently
seeking
a curriculum that is appropriate for
children and youth to
do presentations
for them as
well. In our,
field, we've learned that too many times there's
been
people go and talk to kids or try
to teach kids how to protect themselves, but

(03:35):
they haven't been really
focused on
teaching adults to keep an eye out on
children and how to intervene and what to
do. Here we have the most precious commodity
in our children,
and we're trying to make them be responsible
for for staying safe when it should be
us being
the the guards of their of their, futures

(03:57):
and protecting them?
I,
excuse me, originally developed interest in this subject
when I was a a foster parent.
And the the way I got to be
a foster parent, I feel Jackie might find
a little interesting. I was I was stationed
in Nome,
and I had a case to, to work
in a nearby village, and there was a

(04:18):
social worker whose office was upstairs.
Also had a case there, and we decided
to share the
ride. So on the two hour drive, in
order to pass some time, I said, well,
what do social workers do anyway?
And among other things, she said that we
also have, we,
develop and monitor foster parents.

(04:38):
What's that? Says I. So she begins to
tell me about what it's all about, how
you take in this child who might have
some
family difficulties and blah blah blah. And I
said, oh, that's interesting.
You you might come by and talk to
my wife someday. She might be interested in
something like that. Very next morning, bright and
early, that same social worker was on my
doorstep with a box of Pampers and an

(05:00):
infant.
That was the entirety of my background check,
my training, everything that went along with being
a foster parent.
And that situation didn't change very much in
Alaska for
quite a long time. My second foster child
was a very similar
situation,
panicking
social worker, knocking on the door. We have

(05:20):
this girl coming in. She's the plane's gonna
land in an hour. We have no place
to put her because well, I can't. I
have my brother-in-law just well, we don't just
put up a curtain. Just do it. It's
begging me to take this kid.
Again, no background, no training, no anything. And
we fumbled our way through that kid who
wound up changing my life for the better
or worse. I don't know. But got me

(05:40):
interested in this field.
That's that's my story. Yeah. That's how I
got involved in this. Well, I I guess
I could go go on a little bit
more more with the kid. It turned out
the kid was,
who lived in a village, was was very
badly sexually abused from,
I don't know when,

(06:00):
very, very early. When she was about
six, her mother
shot her father with a shotgun as he
came home drunk
after
being out partying
and, didn't kill him, though, but he lied
lay there on the floor with a stomach
wound. She tried to shoot him again, but
didn't realize she had to,
recock the shotgun. Now that these these are

(06:22):
this kid's earliest memories.
Anyway, we acquired her in the same way
and
started to learn about all the difficulties kids
have for their entire life. At the time,
we didn't even know she'd been sexually abused.
I mean, she was just a little kid
that seemed. Come on. You can't have that.
Yeah. You can.

(06:43):
And that's the hardest thing for people to
realize that
it happens, and there's no
type.
It's they're not they're not, all
locomotive breath. They're,
well, my famous arrest was
a Baptist minister on Father's Day.
So they can come from all walks of

(07:03):
life.
Very true.
Very true.
One in four women, is that the statistic?
It seems that might be low.
Well, that that's who's reporting. They're right. I
mean, they say one in ten children,

(07:24):
is what they're saying, and they they break
down the statistics,
you know, between
males and females, and I didn't bring that
before or for with me. But,
it
too many. Too many. And too many for
men too. And and the trauma is the
the issue,
seems to me,
because that's the fog that sticks over people

(07:46):
and they carry forward in life and have
to recover from.
And everything you had a quite a long
list of attributes that Wally House is working
on. That sounded incredible.
Well, we also are doing, we have a
contract with our Oregon Department of Human Services
local
district where we have a worker that when

(08:09):
we have a child that's either at risk
of being removed from the home
or being or is being returned to the
home,
she does, in home safety and reunification
services. So she is part of
the team that works with the family. The
family is
asked who who they find to be supportive.

(08:30):
So it could be they have might have
family or church members that come and check
on them and help them, mentor them.
The caseworkers come and help them as well
as their support staff, and then our person
also is one of those that are part
of that group that
supports families to to, you know, help parents
get through whatever rough spot they're having

(08:52):
and get them some skills so that they
don't lose their child or so that they're
successful with their child going forward.
So we do that.
You're when you talk about trauma and how
it affects us and hangs over us, that
it was pretty big
probably about ten years ago doing ACEs training,
which is the,

(09:14):
adverse childhood experiences
training,
where
I think both of the CCOs for Oregon
Health Authority, Advanced Health, and AllCare were partnering
to do trainings to help professionals and individuals
recognize
the trauma
that,
the children and adults that they're working with

(09:36):
may or may not have experienced that may
be having an impact on how they're dealing
with life
and,
helps explain why
they may or may not be succeeding
in in their,
you know,
chosen profession or or life, you know, white
life path. So,

(09:59):
it it makes a lot of sense. I
mean, a lot of,
doctors and and nurse practitioners and medical providers
are starting to ask their patients, you know,
so tell me about your childhood. Tell me,
you know, a little bit more about, you
know, how things
were growing up. They have surveys for them
and that type of thing, and they can
help

(10:19):
discern, you know, what they might be able
to do to help with that patient's health.
Because what they're they've learned in the studies
is our ACEs
not only determine how we're going to
be
walking through life, but it also
impacts our health. So,

(10:39):
they've
they've gone back and they've determined that that
type of,
life experiences
shows,
you know, different people
can develop cancer, diabetes.
Not just genetics does it, our our experiences
and how we our our body,
deals with the that emotional trauma. It's quite

(11:01):
fascinating. There's a book called The Deepest Well.
The author is oh, her first name is
Nadine. She's
a pediatrician from California, and it's quite fascinating.
And I don't think it's just the kids
that are traumatized.
I think this,
telephone,

(11:21):
and a social media traumatizes the entire society,
and it's part and parcel of our issues
is as adults.
We
are not
terribly well prepared to deal with the traumas
that the kids are going through because we
haven't yet healed from them ourselves.

(11:42):
I'd I'd agree with you.
As far as,
you know, other other family members, they're
generally shocked to find out that this is
going on. I used to do interviews, and
I would go to the home and and
talk to the mother.
And they would very frequently be in in
very heavy denial, though we would never do
anything like that.

(12:03):
And, if
they also could not understand how if it
was an adopted kid or
a stepchild
or something, that that
was different than their natural,
child. It's no difference at all.
What what what happens in in this in
in in most cases is you have to

(12:24):
drop if you're gonna to become
part of this, you have to drop your
inhibitions to the point to where
it's no longer an inhibition. And it generally
comes on gradually,
for various reasons. And
after a while,
you or the person may be become caught
up in the in the idea that this

(12:45):
is perfectly alright. This is what I should
be doing.
I frequently tell the
investigator or tell the child at the time
that I'm gonna show you what happens so
you know how it's supposed to happen and
not so it's
random or done in a in an abusive
way, and they don't consider themselves to be

(13:05):
abusive.
Wow.
We have ways of fooling ourselves. Yeah. We
we hit it. And part of it is
just talking ourselves into it now, isn't it?
Which
is exactly what Wally's House is trying to
fix with us, it sounds like. We are

(13:26):
a referral service. So act and actually, in
Oregon,
the child advocacy centers are are state mandated
part of the,
investigative process. So
the,
the legislature passed statute that requires that law
enforcement or,

(13:47):
DHS, whoever the referring party is,
call call and get that get a child
in if their,
investigation starts to produce the potential for abuse.
So they,
you know, and as well as the, there's
statutes surrounding
Carly's law.
So where do you fit in the,

(14:09):
in the in the line here? We would
get most of our referrals from social workers
who got them from teachers or
neighbors or something. And,
but you are not
part of the state.
You I guess so things probably come to
you
after they've been investigated somewhere. So,
someone reports

(14:30):
abuse to either the hotline
or
law enforcement,
and
the dispatch sends out law enforcement or the
screener sends sends a
a referral in, and a caseworker goes and
or law enforcement. And sometimes they go together,
like you were talking about your cases.
And they

(14:52):
talk to the reporting person. They
look in on the child and they or
talk to the family and they determine,
you know, we need to find out from
this child
what exactly
happened.
And so we have trained forensic interviewers. They
are trained in the Oregon child,

(15:13):
child abuse
protocols to on how to how to,
question a child in a way that's not
intimidating, it's not leading, it's open and allows
the child
the opportunity to tell their narrative of what
happened.
Back in the eighties
when things were getting really, really,

(15:35):
people were getting really heightened on their understanding
that abuse was happening, sexual and physical abuse,
there was questioning that went on and the
children were interviewed multiple times and stories differed
from one interview to the next. And so
the
those that were in the field of child
abuse said we need to come up with
some way to interview children

(15:56):
that is not going to be
perceived as leading or telling the child what
to say. And so
there are several,
modalities of
child forensic interviewing from you know, there's the
state
version that we have in Oregon that is
approved by the National Children's Alliance. They all,
you know, you all have to start with,

(16:17):
you know,
telling, you know, letting the child know where
the cameras are, what's going on. And then
there are people watching,
in another room. And
it's, but it's all I mean, the child
gets a tour of the facility. They get
to know where people are gonna be, who
they are, what the whole process is. The
children and families that come to our advocacy

(16:39):
centers and Wally's House know
what's happening in the whole building and what
the purpose, you know,
of the building is.
Sometimes you you know, and we try really
hard to make sure that our parents or
or those that are you know, that have
the children know,
what the what the process is so beforehand.

(16:59):
So would
if the the case was referred to the
police, say, at Gold Beach, they would go
to you and and conduct
the interview in your clip? We conduct the
interview. Law enforcement doesn't do that interview. Oh.
And But they sit in on it? They
are in another room watching it. It's just
the child and the interviewer in the interview

(17:20):
room. And this is so you can
have actionable,
outcomes from these interviews that will
work for the child in a court of
law should it ever get there, it sounds
like to me, because
with the earlier situations maybe there was some
issues with that. Sounded like the

(17:43):
if you leading questions are asked, you take
that into court, all of a sudden it
becomes a way of discounting the child's Very
very specific
guidelines that you have to stay within during
these interviews.
Probably the the leading question. We used to
use, what they call anatomically
correct dolls. Do they still do that?
We do not and several of our centers

(18:05):
around the state do not.
If someone uses those dolls, it's because they've
got
a lot of experience
using those dolls and a lot of training
using those dolls.
Now
we
we rely on that child to draw us
pictures.
That's better. I, you know, I was never
trained in the use of the dolls, so
I never I never used I I knew
what they consisted of, but

(18:27):
We have a text, friends.
We have a text from our friend. We
have a text from Rick McNamer who wants
to know I hope you're doing good, guy.
What a sad and tragic ordeal this is,
agreed. What if someone suspects
there might be child abuse going on and
what would be the proper first step to

(18:49):
report it?
If someone suspects that there's child abuse going
on,
I always because I've had people call me
and ask me,
what do I do? And I I tell
them, you know,
list down on a piece of paper
what makes you think that there's abuse
and,

(19:10):
you know, the name of the child, the
name of the parent, if you know the
address so that those that you're
reporting to have an easier time of finding
the the the child and the family to
look into things.
And then you you, you know, you state
very,
logically and calmly
what what you've witnessed, what your concerns are,

(19:33):
and why.
That way,
because I think sometimes we get overexcited and
we can just start to ramble when we
try to call in something.
We've seen an accident or something going on.
So if we suspect there's child abuse,
try to just make sure that we
have the information that they're going to be

(19:53):
asked. How old is the child? If you
know that, you know, if you don't know
that, well, I get I think they're about
five. You know? But,
the child's name, the the adult or the
situation, if there's something going on, you know,
in front of you where, you know, somebody's
yanking on their child out to the out
to the car and the child is, you

(20:14):
know,
you you
I mean, there there are the there's times
where, you know, there's gonna be a kid
pitching a fit and stuff, but there's a
difference there. I mean, you can call 911
and report it to your law enforcement also
if it feels like that child's in immediate
danger.
So And
you have there's a contact number for

(20:36):
Wally's?
No. Actually, I have the Oregon State Or
the Oregon State. Yeah. Oregon State Department of
Human Services,
abuse hotline, and that is (888)
503-7233.
And that leads it's actually for reporting,

(20:57):
you know, elder abuse as well as child
abuse.
So there's different cues and numbers to dial
when you dial. Jackie, give that number again
for people who are just grabbing their pencils.
It is (888)
503-7233.
Sweet. So That 72 spells safe, by the

(21:19):
way. If you if you forget the
the numbers, s a f e.
Very cool.
About reporting, I have
something I think is kinda I I worked
in a very small town initially when I
got into this of about 500 people, and
then there was another town a few miles
away that had five or 600 people.

(21:40):
And I kind of became known for for
for being able to hunt these guys out.
Like I mentioned earlier, the I think I
did them while we were on the Baptist
minister on Father's Day, things like that. And
almost always, when
I had arrested one of these and the
word got out, somebody would come into my
office and say, boy, it's about time you
got a hold of him. You know, we've

(22:01):
all known about that forever.
And
at the at the same time, if there
was a dog that didn't get the proper
amount of water or there was a horse
that showed a rib on its side, people
thought it was people would be banging my
dog constantly, you know, take care of that
dog. But
they don't wanna get involved when it

(22:21):
amounts to a child or the family. And
because these are little towns, everybody knew each
other too. So it was
I always thought that was very odd that
Very odd. Yeah. Would ignore the child. Unfortunate.
You you're exactly right. In fact,
one of the things here in Oregon that
is quite concerning,

(22:43):
to those of us who work in the
child abuse realm,
and even, you know, the adult services realm.
It's you talked about the dog and the
horse. It's easier
for someone to take action if an animal
is abused than if
a a child or an elder is abused
and has suffered some kind of harm.

(23:04):
If that person cannot verbalize
how badly it hurt, it's very hard
for,
prosecutors to make the case and to con
and get a conviction sometimes on some of
these cases. Cannot or
will not. Just as incapable.
Right.
Incapable.
Yeah. It's a good way of putting it.

(23:24):
Because trauma does that to you. Trauma makes
you shut up when you should have spoken
up sometimes.
Sometimes.
Trauma is traumatic.
There's you know, with I can think of,
you know, several years ago, there was an
infant whose parents went in,
out on a date and they left the
child with an adult. And when they came
home, the child was quite battered

(23:45):
and they by the person caring for the
child, and they could not get a conviction
because the child couldn't tell the investigators
or,
or how badly it hurt. It was it
was very frustrating for for people. And that
and that wasn't in this county. I'm just
it's it's a case in order.
Did they go after the parents after that?

(24:07):
Well, no. The parents were the ones who
were
upset that, you know No. I completely understand.
And yeah.
I mean, that person
basically got away with it because their their
victim was unable to be verbal.
The child was left in your care for
three hours, and three hours later after your

(24:28):
care, this was the result, but there was
no way to physically
prove that reality in a court of law.
That person yeah. That or how badly I
think it's the charging part of it as
far as, like, you know, whether it was
an assault one for
all of those. It's very hard for that
piece of it. We do, though, in Oregon,
which is interesting
that that case went the way that it

(24:49):
did because in Oregon, we have Carly's law.
Carly Sheehan was a three year old who
was murdered by abuse.
And so,
the representative or senator from her region
went
to our state
governing bodies and passed a law that if

(25:11):
a child has marks, a question you know,
concerning marks,
mandatory reporters are to, you know, to report
it or if somebody reports it, law enforcement
and Department of Human Services have only a
certain amount of time to photograph those injuries
and get that child in to see someone
who is trained in, diagnosing

(25:32):
abuse or ruling it out, and those are
called designated medical professionals.
We
see those cases from time to time here
in Curry County where,
the child
has visible marks.
And the law is very specific about
the,
injuries and and

(25:53):
what exactly,
needs to be done as far as,
responding to that.
Now, I had initially thought that,
Wally's House was opening up a new facility
here. Is that
wrong?
So we have purchased
a a property right next door to where

(26:13):
we are, and we're expanding our services. So
like I talked about therapy
and prevention,
we
all of our services have been
in the house on Eighth Street in Gold
Beach.
And so we've done forensic interviews. We've done
the medical exams.
We have, you know, a really nice waiting
room, and we have, you know, spots for
the kids to, you know, let the kids

(26:35):
get to play with a lot of toys
in the waiting area and stuff.
And
we just
with mental health services being what they are,
not only in
our country and state but within our county,
it was hard to get kids who had
experienced trauma
in to
start an assessment and therapy in a timely

(26:58):
manner.
And
so
working with grants that had been coming through
and funding resources coming through,
we started looking for a therapist. The only
problem was where do you put your therapy
professional in the waiting room for the those
families? We had a waiting room and we
were not packed with cases every day for

(27:20):
doing interviews and and medical exams. But
should we
develop a program where we had a lot
of
therapy cases and
we you know, do we bump them? Do
you know, what do we do when we
have a case where we have to do
the investigative part? Because we're trying to protect
people's
privacy and trying to abide by HIPAA laws.

(27:43):
So
we started a capital campaign, bought the building,
remodeled it. Our contractor is,
putting in doors and and trim right now,
so we're hoping here within a few weeks,
we can start moving things in. We've had
to
rent a office several blocks

(28:03):
down from us for our therapist to do
our therapy remotely.
And it's hard because it's not
a space where she can have a parent
wait really in another room and visit with
somebody very well. It's so close, and it
doesn't allow for the process of trauma focused
cognitive behavior therapy to be

(28:28):
worked out like it should. There's a there's
a time where you talk to the child.
There's a time you talk to the parent.
You talk to them together. It's just harder
to have that that distance in the space
that we currently are using for therapy. So
we
will be able to have
a play therapy space,
the,
family therapy space, the therapist's office for individual,

(28:53):
interviews as well. We'll have, the administration move
over in that building because I right now,
when in the building that we exist in,
we have,
just this really narrow small space where those
that come to watch the interviews
watch the child talking to our
our selected interviewer. And

(29:14):
you they're sitting on folding chairs and talking
over their shoulders and trying to, you know,
work as a team when they're kind of
just stacked in there awkwardly.
It's kinda hard to you know, you can
get probably four people in there comfortably
on folding chairs, but they don't they can't
face each other or, you know, they have
to tweak around. So we will be moving,

(29:37):
my office over to the new building, and
my office will then become the observation room
for the multidisciplinary
team
that comes for the that particular interview and
investigation.
And then our family room will move into
the boardroom, so it's farther away from
where our interview room is. Sometimes noise carries
over into the interview room and distracts our

(29:58):
interviewees
or the interviewer.
So,
we'll be just kind of stretching out a
little bit and getting a little more
elbow room.
When when I got the, job as the
sexual abuse investigator in Fairbanks,
the before I was there, the interviews that
were done by the police were just done
in an interview room, which is not quite

(30:20):
like Dragnet, but it's it looks like an
interview room. Mhmm. But like you say, metal
chairs and that type of thing. And
so I changed it to where we first
of all, the the the victims would sit
on steps.
So that no matter how
tall or short you were, your feet were
on the ground. Mhmm. You felt stable. And
then I decorated it like a like

(30:41):
well, I couldn't put up like a Bambi
and things like that, but I made like
got an adventure decals and things like that.
It made it a little bit more comfortable.
Of course, the murderers,
I don't know how that did much for
them when they were being in a pit
pit pit pit pit pit pit pit pit
pit pit pit pit pit pit pit pit
pit pit pit pit pit pit pit pit
pit pit pit pit pit pit pit pit
pit pit pit pit pit pit pit pit
pit pit pit pit pit pit pit pit
pit pit pit pit pit pit pit pit
pit pit pit pit pit pit pit pit
pit pit pit pit pit pit pit pit
pit pit pit pit pit pit pit

(31:03):
pit
Well, no. The police will go out on
the call and they'll, you know, talk to
the family and
Through the initial. They'll do an initial, but
they don't do a deep they don't do
a very deep interview
because
what we found is so if you go
out and and you're an investigator and you
do an interview and you get the child

(31:23):
to start talking to you in a in
a manner that where they they're making a
full disclosure,
they don't wanna go to any place else
to talk about what they just told you
about again
and and not you know, I've I have
had interviews where when I was doing forensic
interviewing, you know, they the child

(31:44):
was
in
interviewed at depth. And then when they came
to
our facility,
it was like, I already told that to
so and so. And the nice thing about
doing an interview on camera is it saves
the child from,
the trauma of being interviewed multiple times.

(32:05):
In Oregon,
the accused
the accused has the right to face their
accuser. So children do have to go to
court. For a right when you get stuff
for Yes. Exactly. However, a child can go
to grand jury. And
right now, our DA will, you know,

(32:27):
talk to the interviewer and say, did you
talk to the child? And, you know,
the child will go to grand jury and
the the DA will say, did you talk
to Jackie on, you know, on such and
such a date? Yes. Did you tell Jackie
the truth? Yes. And that's all the child
has to say at grand jury.
Then the grand jury watches
that interview.

(32:48):
The only time that a child has to
you know, where there's
the child is subjected to,
further interview is if it goes to court.
Cross examination.
Right. Exactly. And we you just gotta deal
with that. That's it's unfortunate.
Rick
texts us again. He says, at this time,
do you feel you have

(33:08):
adequate staff and room for your current caseload?
You are
clearly dealing with that currently. And when does
that place open? It sounds like soon, pretty
soon.
And what is your caseload? How many kids
do
you see a year? One Well, we've we've
seen as many as 50 a year.

(33:30):
Most years, it's in the in the forties.
And then, of course,
we in addition to the ones that we
provide the medical exams for and,
the forensic interviews,
we also have a a service where,
when a child is brought into care, they
have to have
through specific screening. So they have to have

(33:50):
a medical screening, a dental screening, and a
mental health screening,
within it used to be sixty days. Now
Oregon Health Authority, I believe it's
that entity that has done this, has shortened
it to thirty days.
And so within the child entering foster care
or resource care,

(34:11):
the first thirty days, they have to have
these screenings done.
And so
we have made our space available to
our,
partners that that do those screenings so that
the children
all come to one space and all the
professionals are there, they do those screenings instead
of
a foster parent or a family member who's

(34:31):
had the child placed with them having to
chase around to all of those appointments
and trying to meet that matrix.
Before
I mean, if you can imagine, you are
a foster parent. If I've had I've had
foster parents with five children from one family
placed with them. And so now they've gotta
chase around and they've gotta do three appointments
for each child. That's 15 appointments.

(34:53):
So by doing what doctor McKelvey from Coos
County
when she was still practicing,
called it she called it Fearsome Clinic.
And so she started it in the Coos
County area. It's it's
come down here.
We've made the space available, and,
we have,

(35:13):
it's right now being coordinated through, Advanced Health.
And,
eventually,
we would like to be able to
take that off of their plate and have
the providers to do that. But,
we're not we're not quite there yet. You
sound like you you are,
or or the Oregon system is
what would be called defund the police. A

(35:36):
lot of people hear that and they say,
oh, you can't defund the police. What that
really means is you're not necessarily taking money
away from the police, but you are or
if you are, you were putting it in
a situation where,
people who are appropriate to go deal with
the situation
deal with it. I went to many cases
where there was a mental health problem. I

(35:56):
there was nothing I could do but arrest
that person, sometimes very forcefully,
and and and take them to jail. A
lot of times, I would just send on
cases
that I was not equipped to handle. And
in
in my case, I learned how to how
to deal with with with, child sexual abuse
and physical abuse,
but I was one of very few in

(36:17):
in my department.
I
we have a we actually have a law
enforcement shortage with our sheriff's department having to
cut positions the way they have. So we,
I don't know about defund the police. I
I have some wonderful
partners within law enforcement that we work with
from each jurisdiction,

(36:39):
you know, from Brookings all the way to
Port Orford. And,
I've,
you know, it's been
interesting. There have been times where someone's come
on duty and or they're dealing with a
case and, like, oh, I didn't know we
had a child advocacy center here. And they're
actually really happy
that we have that they have us to
rely on to help them with this case.

(37:00):
I think it's a it's not so much
a defund the police as, you know, you
know, grab, you know, grab elbows and partner
with the police. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. It's we
we have some really
good investigators and some really dedicated
law enforcement and
I can't say enough good about those that

(37:20):
are on our multidisciplinary
team. We've got
people who really want to see children safe
and wanna see families
heal and made whole if possible.
If if one of my neighbors reported me
for something like that, who would who would
show up on my door to investigate it?
Well, I don't know what your address is,
and I don't know if you wanna tell
me. But are you do you live in
the county? No. I I live, just outside

(37:42):
of town in
in Harbor.
But depend
a dep some kind of county. Would be
the first one. If if they if they
called the police. Yeah. If they called DHS,
it would be a caseworker, depending on what
the allegations were in the when the person
reported it to the to the state,
they may call law enforcement for,

(38:04):
somebody to go with them.
Oh, yeah. We did did that as well.
So
yeah. I did Do are there,
and the sheriff's or the police, are there
specially trained
officers? We have,
they have detectives
at at Brookings PD.

(38:24):
The detectives that we had at the sheriff's
office
are,
have taken jobs elsewhere right now. I'm, you
know, I'm hoping that we're able to see
that
build back. I know there's a a really
bad shortage here right now.
But, no. I I think in Gold Beach,
they've got, you know, they've got good
officers. They they step in and they assist

(38:47):
where they're where they're needed.
Port Orford has a really small force, but
they're
they send us they send us our referrals.
We'll you know, they'll pick up the phone
and call and say, hey, I'm emailing you
a referral form, and, you know, we get
on it. How much do you deal? Do
you at all deal with the bad guy?
We don't. We don't. No. In fact, if

(39:09):
we know someone is a perpetrator,
they are not allowed in our building during
those services. Well, that makes sense. Yeah. So
it's you know, because they can intimidate a
child. We've actually had people that we didn't
know were the offender
come in with the child and the and
we didn't get the results we wanted because
you could tell the kid was off, but
you didn't know,

(39:30):
that that individual was, you know, was there
and intimidating them. So when it comes to,
taking a child out of the home, I
imagine that's the state that that
what's the criteria for that? We had a
lot, in in Fairbanks, we had these advocates
who were against the police,
and one of the easy things for them

(39:51):
to jump on was us. And they,
the the people doing these kind of cases,
and they convinced people that we had no,
no authority, no
training, no anything in doing these interviews.
Sometimes before I could start an interview, I
would have to prove to the parent that
I was
capable of doing it, that that was my

(40:11):
job. And,
but
you still have these people
talk about this. Talking about
taking taking the kids away. They're gonna come
take your kids away,
which didn't happen very often. No. And we
also had a problem in in in Fairbanks
at that time with runaways.
And
it was kind of a a fad almost

(40:33):
to run away. The kids would, would just
get mad at their parents, and they'd go
over to their friend's house,
this side of town. And then I would
get a phone call sometimes. Okay. I'm I'm
done running away now. Would you pick me
up and take me home? I said, no.
I'm not I'm not a taxi service.
So prior prior to these kids and the

(40:55):
the
the thing that we went by, and I
don't know if this is still the case,
is that kids do not lie about sexual
abuse.
If a kid told us they were sexually
abused, we believed them and it was true.
This
when you get up into the teens a
little less,
we thought that there was because of the
there was a runaway thing. You don't wanna

(41:16):
go and then some then they realized, oh,
wow. The cops came and took daddy away.
Mommy doesn't have daddy here anymore.
And they would and they would recant. Recanting
was,
oh, god. I don't know how to work
percentage or very high percentage of of the
kids that
that reported.
Well, a part of the issue when there
is recantation

(41:36):
is so yes, you're saying, you know, daddy
got taken away.
The financial support is gone. And the mother
right away blames the kid. Yes. Why did
you do this? Right.
You're supposed to keep your mouth shut. No.
There's
that's that still happens, unfortunately.
But,
as far as DHS criteria,

(41:58):
I'm not even going to try and and
list their criteria. They have they have specialized
training. They and they have, you know,
you know, they have their rules to follow
and the statute to follow
that, you know,
lets them remove children and then petition the
court for, the court or the state to

(42:18):
take custody.
We don't
we don't have a weigh in on that
at all. We just let them
interview or watch us interview the child and
be there for that,
interview and then
go on from there. And whatever disclosure is
made, they make,
the best decision that they can for the
child and family. And a lot of times,

(42:39):
if you can
get
a parent that's protective
to have that child and the parent that's
alleged to be the perpetrator leave or boyfriend
or girlfriend,
that child can remain home and not be
removed. Now if you have a parent who's
not protective
and they're not going to
believe their child and they're going to stick

(43:01):
by whoever
that person is if they're in the home,
then
DHS
does not have any choice but to try
and find someplace else for that child to
be.
Yeah. Getting the perp to leave is probably
the the the first and best. I
went to a,
class in

(43:22):
San Diego, and there I know it was
just the city of the whole state, but
they actually, in some cases, have a social
worker move into the house and stay there
twenty four hours. That had the same reaction.
Wow.
Yeah. We Yeah. We don't have that luxury.
Even even so, I mean, if these guys
wanna
get a hold of the little girl, they

(43:43):
will anyway. They'll sneak around the it's
pretty amazing the things that can go on.
Well, I apparently have lived most of my
life not realizing that
child trafficking
and the level of abuse that we heap
on our kids
is as terrible as it is.

(44:06):
As,
you know, how
how is it that we have become that
society, or were we always that society?
Who are we? Yeah. You you Can anybody
tell me who we are? We don't know
if we were always and I think a
few we went up on the street right
now and interviewed people going by and said,
what do you think of trans sexual abuse

(44:27):
here? And they would look at us and
say, we don't have that here. This is
a nice place. It's nice people live here.
I think you'd be surprised as to how
many people would also say, though, that
they were
that they had experienced some form of molestation
or child sexual abuse,
and never reported it.

(44:49):
I think that the most reliable
studies that they've done are when you have
people that can
give their answers anonymously
because there's still people who don't wanna talk
about it. It's it's affected them or they've
moved or, you know, they feel it's either
affected them in a way they haven't been
able to deal with it and it's had

(45:10):
negative,
outcomes
for their life or
they've
dealt with it as best they can and
they've decided they're gonna put it behind them
and they're gonna move forward and they're just
not ever gonna look at it again and
they've lived their life and they don't want
to,
to, you know, take it out and look
at it and talk about it. I've heard
a rumor

(45:31):
that you can actually
have,
on the steps behind you, up to 20
abuse victims
telling their story straight up
and have an entire nation or a chunk
of an entire nation in complete denial that
it went on,
even with the congressmen standing there with them.

(45:52):
Right? Because the Epstein thing is a case
in point
of how this society
is freaked out and incapable of dealing with
the concept
of child abuse
on
the
ridiculous level it apparently is going

(46:13):
on at throughout,
you know, in various places in society. And
victim shaming
is the rule, not the exception.
And so how do we get out of
that?
If we don't believe the children, if we
don't take them seriously, if we don't care
for them with all of the care that
you are giving,
and not one or two or 40

(46:36):
a year, but
all of them. Mhmm. All of our children
deserve this kind of protection from us and
the kind of services that you're
providing for them.
Speaking of Epstein, they frequently refer this Epstein
situation as as a pedophile.
Now, as I understand, that's not a pedophile.
He's just somebody who likes young young girl.

(46:57):
Yeah. That's a Pedophile
is somebody who is interested in,
pretty much
prepubescent children.
And
they exist, and
they can't be cured is is the is
the
it's kind of the mantra. It's like
telling a a straight person they,

(47:17):
wanna be a homosexual or vice versa. You
it's just it's their
sexual orientation.
The best they can do is monitor them.
I attended a a seminar one time that
was given by a
organization.
I think they were from California or someplace
that that actually
they were incredibly selective who they took into

(47:38):
their treatment program,
and they said they got if they were
lucky, they got five percent actually came out
with something that they would feel safe about.
Wow.
It's it's very difficult
to to treat an adult sex offender.
In in Absolutely. Yeah. In my experience of
doing it, again, I was in small towns,

(47:58):
so there's not big numbers.
But offhand, I can think of one that
was actually a pedophile,
maybe two. But the others were were
confused, very sad people. I felt very, very
bad for them sometimes.
Like, I can't go into all the details
of what,

(48:19):
what went on with them. But they actually
did develop this this scenario, the little girl
sitting on their lap, their daughter,
and all of a sudden, they're slowly getting
aroused. And they're thinking that this is over
a period of weeks and months or years
even. And they're thinking that, well, then she's
getting aroused too, something like that.
And they've probably been been cut off from

(48:41):
their their what would be their normal sexual
impulses,
and they
convinced themselves that that,
that this little girl wants to do this.
And I don't think I would call out
a pedophile
or an incurable person, but I don't know
that.
That's
just sounds sick to me. Well,

(49:02):
yeah, I didn't say it was a normal
normal person, but I I don't think that
that Help us out of this call this
act, Jackie.
Sorry.
I
I don't
the training that I have is is in
dealing with the children and the advocacy.
And,

(49:23):
I mean,
I've
I've worked with a lot of kids over
the over the years. I've I've worked in
residential care. I've, you know, when I lived
in Texas, I've, you know,
worked with
kids in schools. It's, you know,
and falling into this job has been,
something that has has really, you know, continued

(49:44):
to spark my passion for kids. And so
do I feel like
some of
some some people who fall into
situations where they where they offend, do I
feel bad for them? Do I think that
they're confused?
They're confused.
I don't

(50:05):
I don't have a lot of sympathy for
for someone who chooses to harm a child.
I know that
sometimes people have made decisions
based on on their childhood experiences.
But, you know, there are people who

(50:26):
choose to make a positive impact on their
on their community and their world
based on
their childhood experiences. So it's it it all
boils down to choices.
You just turned it to a nicer thought,
and I was gonna say as we got,
what, maybe eight minutes to go in the

(50:46):
show,
anything positive that you can
point to that you need some help with?
How can the community help you out and
take care of, our kids better?
Well,
our therapist is wanting to
and and our advocates, we would we'd like

(51:08):
to see some volunteers that can come in
and pass go through our application
process, and and then they can be there
when the kids are there.
And the the therapist would, you know, like
to have somebody to visit with the family
while or the parent while they're in in,
doing therapy with the child and and back,

(51:29):
you know, switching out so that they she
can also they can play with the child
while while she's talking to the parent. So
there's there's some stuff like that that that
they can do.
You know,
prior prior to COVID, we had a team
that came in every other week
and cleaned our building for us. The the
staff do it now, which we're not above

(51:50):
doing that, but it would it'd be helpful
if, you know, there were we had people
that, you know, wanted to
come in and do that or garden or,
you know, we have some flower gardens. We're
gonna be,
redoing the backyard of the building and putting
up a fence so that kids can go
back there and play when they're in there
for therapy or for an interview.

(52:12):
I have a wish list for us on
Amazon, but one of my staff said it's
not working right now. So I need to
go back in and play with that. I
assume you can always use funding too? Yes.
We've you know, we embarked on this capital
campaign.
We've had people who have
pledged money
for for it.
We're,
you know, we're

(52:33):
we've raised about a million and a half.
We're that was our goal. We you know,
we're still paying for things that you know,
to make the building work. We're also using
those funds for,
you know, some of the grants that I
have won't allow me to buy food, so
we use unrestricted funds for buying snacks and
juices for the kids that when they come.

(52:54):
So you have a website, I assume, that
we could We do. It's www.wallyshouse.org,
and we have a link on that. We
have a fundraiser
in the spring every year and in the
fall. We're
just now
planning our
second

(53:14):
heroes event. So we have an event where,
individuals have been nominated as heroes of Curry
County's children, and we host a dinner where,
our team members and community can come together
and celebrate those individuals who've made an impact
on
our field of work here in Curry County.
So it's kinda it's you know, we don't

(53:36):
we don't fundraise for it. We do get
some sponsors for it. You know, attendees
can pay for it. We're just about ready
to launch that. I finally nailed down my
keeter,
so we'll be putting that out so people
can make food selections and and,
pay to come to that.
Maybe we should have started off with this,
but could you kinda quickly

(53:57):
go over how you how Wally's House came
about?
Oh,
I'd love to. So,
in 02/2014,
I started
as the county's
coordinator,
director, and interviewer,
for the child advocacy program that was under
our county's district attorney's office.

(54:19):
It was not a nonprofit
at that
time. And,
Jeri Honeycutt,
was somebody that I knew from Suropup in
the St. Louis Beach. And she said, I
know what a child advocacy center is, and
and that's not a child advocacy center. She
she said,
I was in the basement of the courthouse.
I had an office that has the

(54:41):
the computer that
that recorded the interviews. I had an interview
room. And then on the other side of
my office, I had another room where,
grand jury would meet. And
so
Just going into the basement and the courthouse
would be somewhat intimidating, I think. There is
nothing about that that is non intimidating, child
friendly, or trauma informed.

(55:02):
But that was the best that we could
do at the time. The multidisciplinary
team had the interview room there. If a
child required a medical exam, they called the
health department. Patty Savage was the pediatric nurse
practitioner and our county's designated medical professional.
And depending on where she was that day,
you know, she'd make arrangements to meet up
with the child somewhere,

(55:23):
at probably one of the health department offices
and and do that medical.
So,
then
Jerry lost Wally,
to cancer. And she
said, I'm thinking of buying a property from
one of one side of the of the
family trust and then doing something for the
community. And one of the options she had

(55:44):
was a child advocacy center,
which I immediately responded, we could call it
Wally's House.
And she that was October 2014. We'd lost
him in August.
December, she finished the purchase.
March, she started renovations. We moved in in
October
2015.

(56:04):
And her only caveat to all of that
was you have to create a nonprofit.
And when the building or when the nonprofit
is sustainable, I'll donate the building to the
nonprofit. So in 02/2020,
she donated the building to our nonprofit.
And you're looking at a woman who had
knew that
the word nonprofit but didn't know the first
thing about creating one or running one.

(56:26):
And, it was And now you are one.
We are one. We are one. We got
our we got our nonprofit,
designation in 02/2016.
I've had wonderful board members and supportive board
members,
wonderful community members. The staff that we have
are
very dedicated, very,

(56:47):
very passionate about intervening where there's child abuse,
and I'm really excited about our prevention specialist
and getting her out into the community
and getting our community
educated
on That prevention is a very important thing.
Does she go to school? And,
I know the thing that that we would

(57:08):
try to teach a child is that it's
not okay. You don't have to I didn't
want my
answers to come and I hated this. They'd
kiss me with all their makeup and they'd
wanna pinch my cheek or the butcher would
run up. That's that's not good anymore. No.
The kid doesn't like it. The kid could
say to the butcher, don't do that. I
don't like that. Yeah. We have a video
that we take to, Safety City, and the

(57:29):
kids get to watch it. It's called I
Am the Boss of My Body. Yeah.
That was basically my prevention program for a
number of years. So, yeah, Kobi is our
prevention specialist, and she is trained in
darkness to light. And she has some other
presentations to do as well. So we're looking
forward to that program taking off.

(57:50):
Wow.
I I had a a foster kid for
a short period of time who was heavily
trained in that, and,
and it didn't take anything for her to
no. You can't do that. You know? I
can. You know? I'm not hurting you. I
just Right. Yeah. The adults need to know
too that to respect when a child I

(58:10):
mean, if we get to, as adults say,
who can and can't touch us, we need
to say to the child, okay.
I've had many relatives
say, oh, go kiss your auntie Jackie. And
the kid's like
I'm like, no. Leave him alone. They'll come
say hi when they want to. And they
do.
That's the music that says it's almost over.
Almost Or, actually, it is over. I mean

(58:32):
Thank you, Jackie, for joining us and telling
us all about Wally's House because
that's
a beautiful,
thing. We need help. Wally'shouse.org.
Get your credit card out and send up
some money.
Thank you for your invitation.