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Cramped Advocacy Center Hopes It Can Expand

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From left: Child Protective Investigator Dennis Ward and Child Protective Investigator Becka Kampman discuss work at the Children Advocacy Center in Sebring

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By MANDY SHEETS | Highlands Today

Published: May 28, 2008

Updated: 05/29/2008 04:52 pm

SEBRING — The Children's Advocacy Center could be doubling in size in the next 18 months.
Jeff Roth, director of the center, announced plans for the 8,300-square-foot, $1.2 million expansion at Wednesday's Children Ser-vices Council meeting.

The space, which would be added to the rear of the existing building, would allow the Department of Children and Families and Guardian Ad Litem to move their operations in the building.
Roth said the centralization of services not only leads better communication between the agencies but also the economy of time due to central record keeping.

Roth has presented plans for the expansion to the Highlands County Board of Commissioners, and they will have preliminary discussions about the project at a budget workshop this afternoon.
Space in the center became a premium when the Highland's County Sheriff's Office Special Victims Unit relocated there in December.

Now the Department of Children and Families, which has one child investigative unit in the center, wants to move its second child investigative unit, adult investigative unit and legal department, too.
The Guardian Ad Litem office is slated for demolition in 2010 and also wants to move to the center. Guardian Ad Litem organizes volunteers and staff members who protect the rights of children and act as their guardians in court.

"The proximity of that operation to the courthouse is essential," Roth said. "They also use the same data and records that we do, so they are constantly here using our resources."

The project has a tight timeline because DCF has to move its units out of the current location before November 2009.

The commissioners would have to front $750,000 and DCF would pay an accelerated lease rate during a 10-year period to repay it.

Ann Berner, district administrator for DCF, said DCF officials are determining which projects to fund, and she will know in the upcoming weeks whether this lease agreement is funded.

The Children's Services Foundation has contributed $125,000 to the expansion project, and Roth said he will try to raise funds, receive grants and collect in-kind donations of goods and services for the remainder of the project costs.

The co-locating will consolidate victim referrals, which will all be processed through a centralized protocol. All agencies in the center have access to one another's data.

"Part of what makes this collaboration work is the ability to share data," said Highlands County Sheriff Susan Benton. "Everything we have in our booking and criminal investigation units can be shared with DCF in this office. Sometimes just the ability to quickly look up information makes a difference when they are placing a child."

Ruth Handley, a founding member of the Children's Services Council, said this sharing of information is one of the key components of the center.

"We started this initiative because of the turf guarding that was going on; no one shared any information," Handley said. "Data is useless to collect if the people who need it cannot access it."
Another potential construction projects will address a major issue at the center - lack of parking.

"My biggest nemesis in my eight and a half years here has been parking," Roth said. "We have a lot of big meetings in this building and we have 25 people who work here who don't have enough room to park."

Construction of the new parking lot, which will be built over a retention pond south of the center, will cost about $61,500 and add 91 parking spaces.

The public parking lot in the downtown area also will accommodate parades, fair ground events and high school activities. The lot also will reduce illegal parking on medians and right of ways, which creates safety concerns with the bus traffic for Sebring High School.

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