Child Abuse Listening and Mediation (CALM)—a Santa Barbara-based nonprofit organization dedicated to putting an end to child abuse—has opened its doors to the North County community.
Thanks mainly to a grant from the county’s Department of Alcohol, Drug, and Mental Health Services, the organization will be offering counseling and preventative treatment to local families affected by child abuse.
CALM will also take on the cases of families served by Sojourn, Inc., a social welfare organization shuttered earlier this year.
“When Sojourn closed its doors, there was an emergency need for another agency to step in and take those cases,” CALM therapist Jennifer Padilla-Burger said at a special ribbon-cutting ceremony on Dec. 6. “The families went without services for about two months, but now we’re here and ready to provide them the help they need.”
And that need is great. Statistics from CALM reveal that close to 80 percent of the county’s Child Welfare Services cases are located north of the Gaviota Tunnel. To compound the problem, the North County suffers from a shortage of bilingual and bicultural services.
Child abuse stems from an abundance of sources, but why is there a higher instance of cases in the North County? Ryan Smith, interim manager of CALM’s Great Beginnings North County program, said, “generally speaking, it’s because there’s more poverty in the North County.
“People who are living in poverty are exponentially more likely to be exposed to drug use, family life stress, and other factors that make it more likely for parents to be violent with their children,” he explained.
Smith said the North County has also been hit harder by a growing epidemic of methamphetamine use.
“Meth use increases instances of all kinds of abuse—from neglect all the way to sexual or physical abuse,” he said. “And the cognitive and behavioral impacts of that abuse are life-long.”
According to Smith, approximately 1 in 10 children in Santa Barbara County are born “tox-positive,” meaning they were exposed to drugs and alcohol in-vitro.
Such traumas inhibit children from developing the basic skills needed to succeed in life—controlling emotions, staying on task, and forming meaningful relationships—and can lead to serious health problems and even death.
Smith said the highest rate of death among children—after conflicts between male adolescents—is in early childhood.
“That’s why [CALM] focuses so much on early childhood development,” he said.
CALM offers a diverse range of programs and services designed to prevent, assess, and treat childhood abuse. These programs serve children and adults who have witnessed or been victim to abuse or violence; educate adults about healthy parenting and healthy living; and offer in-home and school-based training for abuse prevention.
During a tour of the new CALM office on West Carmen Lane, Smith discussed one of the organization’s specialized treatments: Parent-Child Interaction Therapy.
Developed at U.C. Davis, the therapy teaches parents how to interact with their children and address their behavioral issues.
“A lot of parents feel inadequate because they don’t know how to handle their child’s behavior,” Smith said, adding that the parents in this program usually weren’t taught vital behavioral skills as children themselves.
“Many of them have trouble facilitating playtime with their children,” he said.
To address this problem, the therapy staff leaves the parent and child together to play in a room. Then, using a two-way mirror and a one-way microphone, the therapist observes the interaction and essentially coaches the parent on how talk to his or her child.
“One of the things we struggle with is getting the parents to put our teachings into practice,” Smith said. “So this is one way we’re really able to get them to do that.”
CALM staff members anticipate the new office will provide services, such as the Parent-Child Interaction Therapy, to hundreds of North County residents.
Added Smith: “The office is meant to serve as a sanctuary away from home, because usually the child’s home environment is so chaotic.”
Contact Managing Editor Amy Asman at aasman@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in Dec 9-16, 2010.