GREAT BEND, KS., November 8, 2011: The Family Crisis Center, Inc. announces the re-launch of its website today. Located at www.familycrisiscntr.org, the site has been re-designed to reflect the center’s new logo and gives information about domestic violence, sexual violence, and stalking along with available services and contact information. “The website allows us to reach a greater number of people in the ten counties we serve and beyond,” says Laura Patzner, executive director of The Family Crisis Center, Inc. “The re-designed site is very exciting but everyone needs to understand that accessing a website is not confidential and activity can be traced.”

In addition to the redesigned site, the agency unveils its Facebook page www.facebook.com/FamilyCrisisCenter/, developed to share information and engage others to learn more about domestic and sexual violence so that they can become more involved in efforts to prevent and eliminate it. “Facebook friends will see links to articles of interest, reminders of upcoming events and trainings, and instantly be a part of the conversation around ending domestic violence and sexual assault in our communities.” explained Patzner.

“While we understand that not everyone has access to the web, these new sites are important tools that create a flow of information to our community partners, citizens and to survivors who do access the web and may not know that help is available,” Patzner stated.

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The Family Crisis Center, Inc. provides advocacy and services to survivors of domestic and sexual violence 24-hours a day seven days a week in Barber, Barton, Comanche, Edwards, Kiowa, Ness, Pawnee, Pratt, Rush and Stafford counties. Education and training for service providers and community members is available upon request. To talk with an advocate, call our 24-hour crisis line at 620-792-1885 or toll free at 866-792-1885. For more information about the agency, or to learn how you can get involved, contact Laura Patzner at 620-793-9941.

Two new programs under development

The Family Crisis Center is currently developing two new programs; Child Exchange/Visitation Center and Dell Hayden Memorial Child Advocacy Center.

The Child Exchange and Visitation Center is designed to provide safe exchange for children when visitation has been order in domestic violence cases. Trained Exchange/Visitation Supervisors facilitate safe exchanges by developing strategies that will limit or eliminate contact by the adults so the child or children are not further exposed to the emotional and sometime physical violence. When supervised visits are ordered, these supervisors monitor visits within the center’s visitation rooms to make sure appropriate interactions are occurring and the child remains safe.

The Dell Hayden Memorial Child Advocacy Center, named for the first Director and mother of current director, creates a safe space to complete forensic interviews of children who have reported being sexual assaulted or abused. A multi-disciplinary team comprised of law enforcement, prosecution, mental health, medical and advocacy personnel work together to interview a child in a comfortable environment without multiple interviews. This approach has shown to be less traumatic for children and has a higher conviction rate for the prosecution. The Dell Hayden Memorial Child Advocacy Center will have an interview room with cameras to record the interview, a team room so that the team can watch the interview and send questions into the forensic interviewer if more information is needed and a family room for the non-offending parent to sit and wait while the interview is taking place.

The target date for these new programs is Winter of 2012.