Safety. Comfort. Hope. Those are the key ingredients that abused children need to feel like they’ve done nothing wrong and they can become kids again.

Catherine Ballance with Advocates for Children spoke to Calhoun Kiwanis Club members Wednesday afternoon about child abuse prevention and care.

Advocates for Children is a nonprofit facility that coordi-nates the efforts of investigation, intervention and treatment for children involved in domestic violence situations in a non-threatening location in Bartow County.

Ballance, development director of Bartow County chapter of Advocates for Children, told Kiwanis members that her organization takes care of ten teenagers at a time and also works as a method of helping abused children find a new home.

“Believe it or not, people aren’t lining up to take a house-ful of teens,” said Ballance emphatically.

In an interview, she explained that they work closely with the Department of Family and Children’s Services to look for homes for children.

“They help with placement and they can help make rec-ommendations,” she explained.

Advocates for Children has interviewed more than 100 vic-tims of child abuse a year, and now serves almost 1,200 vic-tims a year at several locations throughout Georgia.

“Neglect is the number one reason of abuse,” said Bal-lance.

Children at the facility in Bartow County can come from areas throughout Northwest Georgia.

“I think of advocates as a nonprofit umbrella,” she said.

She also reminded Kiwanis members that child abuse is hidden in our community.

“The nature of abuse is that it’s hidden,” she added.

Visit www.advochild.org to learn more about the group.