The Family Refuge Center raises Awareness at CU

On February 22, Amanda Buchanon, sexual assault program coordinator from the Family Refuge Center based in Princeton, W.Va., gave a talk on the Concord University campus to raise awareness for the Center’s mission.

    The Family Refuge Center was founded with a grant from the Office of Violence Against Women through the Department of Justice. Currently, it is located across from the courthouse in the Princeton professional building. “In founding this non-profit organization, they documented the need for domestic violence services, and from that they realized there were other things that were needed in the community, including sexual assault advocacy, children’s programs, and services for men,” states Buchanan.    

    Currently, the Refuge Center provides outreach services in Monroe, Pocahontas, and Mercer county, with their main office in Lewisburg in Greenbrier county. “We have a family visitation center where people that have custody issues or are not on good terms with the other custodial parent can have a safe place to exchange the children. They have sexual assault and sexual violence advocacy in all three of those counties. They include medical accompaniment to the hospital for sexual assault, exams, legal advocacy, or protective service orders, domestic violence protection orders, and accompaniment to court,” Buchanan says.

    “We also have a shelter that provides services to women and children, and we also provide services to men even though men can’t come to our shelter, we’ll provide them with shelter, whether that be in a hotel or another safe place. We also serve minority communities, including everybody in the LGBTQ community.”

    Family Refuge Center will welcome any sexual abuse victim or anyone in need of services above the age of 14. “We accompany them to the hospital as well as to the police station for interviews or to the courtroom. With our sexual assault services, we also have therapy provided to survivors of sexual assault whether it be a sexual assault that happened this year or any time in your life. We also offer some peer support services as well as a 24 hour hotline service which is totally free to any survivor or secondary abuse victim. If you’ve experienced any type of trauma in your life you know it doesn’t just affect you, it affects the people around you.”

    Buchanan stresses the importance of prevention education, another service provided by the Refuge Center. “Most of the time it’s someone you know, close friend, or someone that you’ve just met. It doesn’t just happen to women, as much as we like to think that a man can just defend himself, men get sexually assaulted and they get sexually assaulted by women. So another thing we provide is prevention education from kindergarten all the way up through high school and on to college as well. Although we don’t have a prevention education here in Mercer County, that is something that will eventually be made available, so you’ll probably see more and more things floating around,” Buchanan states.

    Family Refuge Center partners with other non-profits in the state such as Stop Abusive Fanmily Environments, (SAFE). The Refuge Center will refer clients to SAFE, which handles cases of domestic violence, if it is in accord with the wishes of the victim. “I’m domestic violence trained, so if they have an issue with domestic violence I’ll refer them to SAFE. If we end up having a client that we’re both working with, we collaborate and organize. Whatever the client wants. We don’t want to bounce back and forth too much.”

    The Family Refuge Center offers counseling services for trauma, and for any stage of the healing process. Buchanan says, “A lot of people that I have spoken with that were assaulted, they had something happen to them before at some point, or the ones that just come in about something that happened to them maybe in their childhood. One thing I’ve found out is there’s no end to the service. If someone has had a traumatic experience, they don’t have a time frame as to how long Family Refuge Center will work with them, it’s until they feel they don’t need the service. But all of this is free and it’s what we’re here for.”

    One awareness event is coming up in April. Their Light the Night Candlelight Vigil is taking place April 7 at 7 p.m. at the Dick Copeland town square on Mercer Street in Princeton. “I guarantee you there is at least one person in your life that has been a survivor of sexual assault,” says Buchanan. She  encourages anyone to attend to support the cause. A sexual assault survivor might speak at the event, and anyone willing to speak may contact Amanda Buchanan with a prepared speech. Speaking, however, is not required or asked for at the event.

    “We’re always looking for people to volunteer. Being an advocate is very important work, and you don’t have to have a degree in your hand to do that for someone, to be an advocate for someone. All the training is in-house, there’s about 40 hours of training. You don’t have to be a pre-med student to do that. The only thing that we’re there for is to make sure that the needs of the victim are heard, and that their rights are not violated.”

    For further information, visit familyrefugecenter.org