Intermediate League donates $10,000 to Children’s Advocacy Center
The GFWC Intermediate League of Butler recently donated $10,000 to the Children’s Advocacy Center of Butler, the largest of a series of charitable donations which totaled $20,000 to 12 different nonprofit groups.
The Children’s Advocacy Center will use the money to bring in experts from the Human Trafficking Training Center to conduct training sessions on how to combat human trafficking. The training is mainly intended for local law enforcement agencies and first responders, but is open to other members of the public.
“The center will conduct training sessions specific for law enforcement and partnering agencies in Butler County initially,” said club member Vickie White. “The training will be opened to the community and neighboring law enforcement if possible.”
Training sessions will take place Sept. 26 and 27 from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. at the Steamfitters Technology Center on Wise Road in Butler. The instructors are the Human Trafficking Training Center’s co-founders: Dan Nash, former Missouri State Trooper, and Alison Philips, former director of Missouri’s Human Trafficking Task Force.
Throughout the training, students will be taught to recognize the signs of possible human trafficking and successfully investigate trafficking cases.
The Children Advocacy Center first got the idea to bring instructors from the Human Trafficking Training Center to Butler when they met at the Crimes Against Children Conference in Dallas last year.
“It was a large conference, and a lot of it was focused on child trafficking,” said CAC executive director Danielle Schmidt. “We saw these trainers firsthand, and we were really impressed by the presentation that they did.”
The grant makes up half of the $20,000 in total that the Intermediate League of Butler awarded to community organizations this year. The Children’s Advocacy Center was one of 12 groups to receive grants, which ranged from $10,000 to $500.
According to Intermediate League president Yolanda Cypher, the $10,000 given to the center is the largest the Intermediate League has ever awarded to a non-profit.
The money for the donations was raised at the 71st annual GFWC Antique Show and Sale, which was March 17-19 at the Tanglewood Senior Center in Lyndora.
Non-profit organizations in Butler County are invited to apply for grants early in the year. A committee reviews each request and presents a list of grant recommendations. According to White, this is the most that the club has ever been able to donate to help the Butler community.
Other organizations that received money from the the league this year include the Tanglewood center, the Butler YWCA, the Butler Musical Theatre Guild, Friends of Preston Park, the Butler Arts Center, Butler Area Public Library, Butler County Symphony Association and Storm Harbor Equestrian Center.
