Safe Passage gains national accreditation for its Child Advocacy Center in Coeur d’Alene

Trained to offer emotional support to a child who has experienced abuse, Lucy the Labrador with Safe Passage Children’s Advocacy Center is there to snuggle if they have a forensic interview, medical exam or court visit.

Lucy is just one part of a new distinction for the Coeur d’Alene center that was years in the making: In mid-December, the site received accreditation from the National Children’s Alliance under its standards for best practices.

“It’s the highest level in quality of services for children and families experiencing abuse,” said Scott Coleman, the center’s director.

Centers take a multidisciplinary approach – in collaboration with law enforcement, health care providers and state child protective services – to support child victims of sexual and physical abuse. Coleman noted that child advocacy centers are a nationwide model.

The Children’s Advocacy Center in Coeur d’Alene serves several North Idaho counties and does 250 forensic interviews a year, working with children ages 3 to 17 and a small number of adults with cognitive disability. It partners with Coeur d’Alene Pediatrics, for a pediatrician to come to the center to conduct a child’s medical exam if needed.

The center also offers advocacy for nonoffending family members and connects children and family members to trauma-informed counseling.

Nationwide, the accrediting organization requires a lengthy application process and site review for how each center responds to those allegations by using evidence-based practices and coordination with local agencies.

Professionals in modern child advocacy have learned more about how trauma and abuse impact kids, Coleman said. Early intervention, support and counseling can break generational cycles of abuse, Coleman added.

“Back in time, if a kid was abused physically, sexually or witness to a violent crime, they’d be interviewed by multiple different professionals – so law enforcement, health and welfare, doctors, lawyers, prosecutors – all these different agencies interviewing a kid,” he said. “A lot of them were not necessarily trained to interview a child in a way that’s not asking leading questions, and a lot of them were not informed on how to ask trauma-informed questions, so they’re re-traumatizing a child by talking to them over and over.”

Today’s forensic interviews are more sensitive and hold up in court better, he said.

A trained provider conducts the interview, which is observed through closed-circuit cameras and audio in another room by someone with law enforcement, a pediatrician and state health and welfare worker.

The pediatrician then goes with the child into another room at the center set up for medical exams, and the physician doesn’t have to ask additional questions, Coleman said.

Nonprofit Safe Passage took over the Child Advocacy Center in 2012, a few years after another organization started it. Before its recent accreditation, the center followed the same practices under guidance of the National Children’s Alliance.

Coleman credits the community and other agencies serving children that brought this accreditation, including Spokane’s Partners with Families & Children Children’s Advocacy Center.

Funding and support for the center came from Kootenai Health, Kootenai Foundation, the Coeur d’Alene Tribe, Inland Northwest Community Foundation, the Governor’s Task Force for Children at Risk and the Kootenai County Sheriff.

Coeur d’Alene is able to meet national standards for the care and treatment of abused children, he said.

“The community itself has gathered together to take care of our kids. This was a collaborative effort,” he said. “It’s also important to understand child abuse does happen everywhere. We see about 250 kids a year here. Those are just the reported cases.”

The Safe Passage nonprofit has a separate Coeur d’Alene office for adult victims of sexual or physical abuse. It also operates an off-site emergency shelter for those fleeing domestic violence or sexual assault. Safe Passage opened in 1977, previously named the Women’s Center.

Coleman said a 2022 grant supported the Kootenai Health hospital’s new Sexual Assault Nurse Examiner program and the Children’s Advocacy Center. As part of that grant, the center got funds toward the medical exams, the camera system, some staff and training for the multidisciplinary team, he said.

“That grant really enabled us to meet accreditation. The biggest hurdle getting accreditation recently was developing more active partnership with a pediatrician’s office, which we’ve done with Coeur d’Alene Pediatrics. We also have a strong partnership with Kootenai Health, and they provided this space to us.”

He said the center now partners with several regional therapy groups for telemental health, paid for through grant and community funding along with private donations, but getting there was “a major hurdle.”

Spokane leaders at Partners, which has two facility dogs, helped connect the Coeur d’Alene site to Lucy, who joined them in August 2022. She is trained and owned by Assistance Dogs Northwest.

Children feel more at ease when Lucy is in the room, said Coleman, who is her handler.

“There are a lot of kids who wouldn’t feel comfortable about disclosing abuse unless Lucy’s there.”