Kids’ HOPE Center gets big boost from Coquille Tribal Grant, March 1

The Kids’ HOPE Center just received a $12,500 grant from the Coquille Tribal Community Fund to help in the on-going battle to reduce child sexual abuse in our area through community awareness and intervention. JoAnne Shorb, Program Director of the Kids’ HOPE Center, said the Coquille Tribal Grant funds will help in the Center’s effort to partner with local school districts. “Essentially, this helps us provide the school districts with funding to help remove the obstacles associated with being in compliance with the current law, known as Erin’s Law (SB 856), requiring age appropriate child sexual abuse education in K through grade 12 schools.” Bay Area Hospital’s Kids’ HOPE Center is the Child Abuse Assessment & Intervention Center (CAIC) for Coos County. As a predominantly child serving organization, the center’s mission and vision encompasses the endeavor of reducing child abuse through community awareness, intervention, and through the provision of supports for healing and victim justice. The numbers of referrals the Kids’ HOPE Center receives has gone up year after year and although Erin’s Law went into effect as of the 2015-2016 school year, not a single Coos County School or district was able to fully meet the requirement due to the heavy financial burden. Founded in 2001 by the Coquille Indian Tribe, the Tribal Community Fund has distributed more than $5.5 million to support projects in the areas of education, health, public safety, arts and culture, problem gaming treatment and historic preservation, in a five-county region of Southwestern Oregon. This year the Fund awarded grants totaling $372,000. The deadline for applications for the next round of funding is November 30, 2017. For more information, visit the Fund’s website at www.coquilletribalfund.org.