April is Child Abuse Awareness Month and the Snohomish County Volunteer Guardian ad Litem (VGAL) Program is making sure the community is aware by hosting its first Pinwheels for Prevention® event Tuesday, April 7 at the Denney Juvenile Justice Center in Everett.
Snohomish County Executive John Lovick is scheduled to deliver a proclamation at noon outside the juvenile justice center at 2801 10th Street in Everett. Other honored speakers include Snohomish County deputy prosecuting attorney and the 2015 recipient of the Norm Maleng Advocate for Youth award, Adam Cornell, along with advocates familiar with the dependency court system.
Following the brief program there will be a reception and “planting” of 400 pinwheels, representing the number of abused and neglected children in the court system currently in need a VGAL to represent them in the dependency process.
The blue pinwheel has become a national symbol for child abuse prevention. Communities nationwide are planting pinwheel gardens as a way to call attention to the needs of children in their neighborhoods.
In addition to raising community awareness about child abuse, the VGAL program hopes to recruit more court appointed special advocates to speak up for our county’s most vulnerable children as they make their way through the dependency court system.
Qualified individuals from all walks of life, cultures, backgrounds and ethnicities are currently being sought to submit an application and begin the interviewing process for the next training scheduled to begin on May 9, 2015. If you are interested in speaking up for a child and becoming a court appointed special advocate with the Snohomish County VGAL program, please call (425) 388-7854 or click here to see the application.
For more information about the April 7 event please contact Interim Community Services Supervisor Kristine Morse at 425-388-7841 or Kristine.morse@snoco.org.