Support for Arkansas Week provided by the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, The Arkansas Times and KUAR FM 89 Hello again, everyone, and thanks very much for being with us.

War in a Faraway Place, except that in our time it is not so far away.

The outlook for the forces of independence in Eastern Europe and the impact on the alliance of which our nation is a part of that, and how that conflict is shaping the economics of Arkansas.

In a moment, we'll speak with a congressman from our state who has just returned from that region.

But first, an emergency of a different sort The hundreds of Arkansas children who have maybe thousands of Arkansas children who have been may still be victims of abuse.

April is Child Abuse Awareness Month, so proclaimed in Arkansas by Governor Hutchinson.

Earlier this week, another Hutchinson, not coincidentally unveiled what is titled The Shine Hope Campaign.

It's a national bipartisan effort to spotlight not only the horror of abuse, but the resources available to the abused.

We're joined now by First Lady Susan Hutchinson, one of 14 gubernatorial spouses who are spearheading the campaign and by Elizabeth Pulley, director of the Children's Advocacy Centers of Arkansas.

Ladies, thanks very much for being with us.

Mrs. Hutchinson, let's begin with you.

How can this week, this month, advocacy month and the Shine campaign, how can it make a difference?

Well, awareness is key.

Heretofore, there was no Children's Advocacy Center, a place where you could take your children and listen to them and then tell everything that's been happening So people didn't necessarily take them to their prosecutor because that could be torturous as well.

So it's important for parents and loved ones of the children to know there is a good way to respond to a child who's telling you something going wrong.

We have I said hundreds, thousands, thousands.

Easily.

Easily.

Are we are we becoming more aware of the problem or is there has there been an increase?

I think the awareness is the part.

I grew up being taught not to get near a car, stop, you know, asking for directions.

As I was walking back and forth to school on a somewhat busy street, I thought stranger danger was the issue.

But when I discovered children's advocacy centers, I realized that as many as one in ten children nationwide have suffered or will suffer child abuse.

By the time they're 18.

We are taught by one in ten, one in ten nationally.

Statistically speaking, one in ten before they're 18, shall have been sexually and or physically abused.

Or are we including emotional abuse and that as well?

Absolutely.

You know, in the Arkansas Child Abuse Hotline receives about 65,000 calls annually, and the number if anyone suspects abuse is 84 for save a child.

And so we want to get the awareness out specially this month in April, but also if you're around then anyone can call 24 hours a day, seven days a week to report abuse.

And that gets the cases going.

And we want to protect the children in Arkansas and to provide the essential resources to a child victim in our state.

What about the child itself who believes that he or she has no recourse, other that the child is in a domestic situation with abusive one or more abusive parents?

How does the child is killing the child, his or her self?

We've gotten calls from young people.

They're not restricted you can call.

And a well trained operator at the state police will answer and asked about the particulars Who are you talking about and what is it that you've observed or you've experienced?

And that information is processed by the state police.

They contact their investigators and the investigators from the state police can go out there or they Department of Human Services sends out their investigators with Child and family services.

Well, my question was about to be.

Are there safeguards in place against a child who simply wants who may be rebellious and simply wants to take revenge against an adult or a guardian?

Well, statistically speaking, they may be rare, but it's rare.

Statistically speaking, there's been research on that.

And the outcome of that investigation was that four to 6% of the time there's false So my admonition is, let's just go ahead and hear them out and let them talk, because the way we do the interviews it's it's hard to keep the lie going.

So it's it's very reliable what the children are telling us.

And we are supervised as we're doing the interview and it's videotaped and recorded.

But the investigators, the prosecutors office, at least two different such people like that, that would be the ones responsible to act on what the child is telling at the interview.

They listen in in real time and can observe as well as send over you know, through a hearing aid thing.

What more they need to be discussed there is that a thorough vetting of an allegation.

So absolutely absolutely.

In you know, a child advocacy center provides a child friendly location for a family.

The caregivers to come and bring their child.

And that is the first stop for the victims to come.

So they receive advocacy support to help the caregiver navigate through this process.

They receive a recorded interview so their child can tell their story in a safe location.

And then if a medical exam is needed, it is performed by well-trained nurses at our centers.

And then mental health in its trauma focus.

Mental health that we provide for our victims.

And that's where the healing begins.

And so it's so important for a child to receive these services in Arkansas and to start the healing process so that they don't have to go to a scary police station in a scary E.R.

that everything that they need is provided right there.

And go ahead.

And we have 27 locations across the state.

So we have and we continue we want to continue to grow.

This movement is not just in Arkansas that it is.

And every single state has child advocacy centers.

State with Arkansas for just a moment.

This is a brick and mortar situation where you I think you said you had 27 active physical locations now.

Yes, we have 27 locations in Arkansas that provide these essential services to children so they can come and receive the services and navigate through the process.

And a lot of times that the process takes a while so that we're there with them.

If it's years later, if it's a year later, if it's a month later, we want to provide the top quality services in serve these children.

And I believe we have your website available now that we can put that up if we're prepared to do that at this time, which will kind of illustrate to the audience.

Yeah.

Okay.

Stacey A Know Casey, Arkansas, or dot org.

And that has the information that of all of our centers across the state.

Yeah.

With me.

Go ahead, Mississippi.

It's important to keep in mind heretofore in times past where the options of the parent or the responsible adult knowing that the child has awful things to report, going to the prosecutor's office, going into the jail, that's not a good situation.

An adult doesn't want to be faced with that.

So by having separate facilities, the police officers, the investigators bring the children to us, they're responsible for them.

We do the interview.

They're observing.

And then from then on, they go and work on that investigation based on that interview that is videotaped.

And so all the responsible people in we call it the multidisciplinary team, they're the official people we're the 501, C three.

Okay.

So we're the outsiders, but we're integral because our people are trained.

How to talk to children for the interviews child first.

So we have a certain protocol for that.

And our interviewers, our forensic interviewers, know how to talk to children of different ages.

We even have help autistic children so we can get the information that they need to tell all the things they need to tell, whatever details we can gently have them express to us and or we can go right in to the medical exam so they know they're well, they're not disease, they're not pregnant, they're whole.

Nobody can tell all these terrible things were done to them.

And then we can go and set them up for the mental health counseling.

It's kind of like a kid's version of post-traumatic stress disorder of what they've experienced, what they've seen, if they've seen their mother beaten to death this year would bring them to us for our services.

And this could, in some cases, culminate in the child being removed from the home via the appropriate through the appropriate legal machinery anyway.

Right.

We don't make those decisions.

Right.

We don't tell any of the investigators what to do or anything Our purpose is working with them and helping them understand the child and that they're not duplicating their services among the group and sharing information.

And as we're doing the counseling with them, if the children have something more to say, but it's just real important to get as much information in one setting at the start, because that's actually the big first step to the healing of the child's thinking.

You know, in us as a person thinks that's how their life goes and their body follows and can be very unhealthy because of the aggravation of their thought.

And you want to take this and both of you want to take this.

Well, it already is it.

It is national.

We are in every state each of the 50 states, and we're also international.

We are in other countries.

This is not an exclusive issue with any group of people or religion or education.

It it's just everywhere.

No one final question, has there been have you recorded a spurt in reported cases of abuse or suspected cases because of the social impact of COVID?

Over the last two years.

And as.

Well, it's interesting what we have seen in Arkansas through our child advocacy, some centers and numbers is that we have increased services 60% since the start of COVID.

So in 20, 21 we served 11,200 children at our Child Advocacy Center statewide.

That's the most ever in our state's history.

And calls the calls of 65,000 calls.

65,000 this last year and about 35,000 of those who were investigated.

We need more people.

We need more resources for the state.

The calls keep coming in and the more we talk about it the more people are alert and they know there is and there's a good answer other than trying to keep the child away from the offender moving, leaving or just ignoring it and saying the kids are resilient and they'll grow out of it and time heals all that's malarkey.

It's not how it works.

Well, one final question.

Are are we appropriately funded now?

The last legislative for last fiscal session is behind us now, but I mean, if you whispered in your husband's ear regarding funding in the past, well, that's up to the legislators.

And we have great support among the legislators unanimously passed the Proclamation for Children's Advocacy Center Day.

Shoutout to Representative Diane Ford.

She did it that first year for us, and she has continued on with that.

Again, it's still raise awareness and that's up to the legislators to figure out just how involved state funding should be because we do kind of lighten the load for the DHS agents who don't have all the training.

And we can give that.

We do rely on a lot of grants, federal government, House and donors, because we don't charge for anything.

We don't use Medicaid.

We don't use those kind of fundings.

So we we rely on the grants, whatever the legislature decides to send our way and the fundraising, we don't charge for anything.

We want all of our services to be available to all the children who need us.

Until they no longer need us.

Mrs. Hutchinson, MS.

Pulley, thank you very much for being with us and good luck with your campaign.

Thank you.

We'll be right back.

And we are back.

US Representative French Hill of Arkansas is back from Eastern Europe after he and other members of the congressional delegation met with government officials of three nations, two of them at the edge of the war in Ukraine, one of them at the very edge.

Mr. Hill joins us now, a congressman in Washington.

Thanks very much for being with us.

Could you give us your overall assessment?

You were in Poland, and I think Romania.

Yeah, Romania.

I'm sorry to give us your overall assessment of the situation at this hour.

Well, Steve, it's good to be with you.

Happy Easter weekend to you.

Yes.

I just got back from Poland and Romania, and some key takeaways were first, Poland and Romania right on the edge of the fight in Ukraine, both bordering Ukraine, both very concerned about the war spilling over into their own countries, have led the way, both in helping humanitarian wise.

You've got two and a half million Ukrainians in Poland, and all those are housed in local Polish family homes.

I thought it was so touching of the way they've reached out to their neighbors.

They also are running a vigorous refugee support operation.

They're the same is true in Romania, and both countries are at the forefront of delivering the lethal aid into Ukraine.

That's necessary for President Zelensky to fight back against Putin's illegal, illegal invasion.

Well, one of one of the individuals with whom you met, I think, is the our ambassador anyway, to Warsaw, to Poland.

What was his assessment of what can you share from your conversation with him?

He was just so gratified to the enthusiastic leadership in Poland with no question, no gap in plans for supporting Ukraine humanitarian aid militarily, and most importantly, supporting the economic sanctions of Poland and Romania, both believe that Europe should band together and do more to cut off from Russian oil and gas, for example.

So he was very impressed with Powell's resolve.

And look, when you're right on the edge of the route of doing border incursions as you recall last year, putting pressure on the poles of this is no time to go wobbly, as Margaret Thatcher said.

So these countries have a lot of resolve to push back and stop Putin's aggression.

Well, you also had a meeting, I think, with the what was the deputy defense secretary or attache defense minister for Poland What was his assessment of of the military situation there?

How and what to what extent could this bleed over into Poland?

Well, of course, that's absolutely the objective of Europe is to not have that happen.

And the best way to do that is to get the Ukrainians exactly the equipment that they need in the Poles the Slovaks, the Romanians all have been doing that.

And we went to a border operation on the border between Poland and Ukraine and witnessed that for ourselves there.

The 82nd Airborne is coordinating all the military equipment going into Ukraine.

From 31 different allied nations to make sure that it's solid, it's functioning, it's approved to be trained, shipped to the Ukrainians, and so the Poles have been providing a lot of support of that operation.

Well, there was also some discontent expressed periodically rapt as it might be in ribbon for a more vigorous US participation in terms of material anyway.

Direct aid to Ukraine prudently in your estimation?

I think there are many things that we can do.

I think President Biden's recent additions to the list that were announced by the White House this week also meet that test.

This gives them a better chance at both air superiority as well as anti-tank infrastructure to prevent attacks over land from the east, and so air superiority of the tank issue.

And then finally some sort of land to see a defense technology is important.

And you saw recently this week in the news cycle an example of the Ukrainians firing a Neptune missile at a Russian ship.

So these are all elements that I think will lead to the Ukrainians beating back Putin's assault.

But the worst is yet to come, I'm afraid.

Well, at this moment, though, you're comparatively satisfied with with the administration's support of the Ukrainians in terms of assistance.

I am I am satisfied.

I think they've been as I've said many times, I think they've been slow in many ways in the lead up to this fight.

But since the fights got underway, the administration is working hard with all of the NATO allies to support Ukraine with the lethal assistance that they need to win the battle against Putin.

Any number of Arkansans, congressmen, your constituents and elsewhere around the state are asking what is in this for?

What are the stakes for Arkansas at not just the two?

First, domestically, Putin's invasion has disrupted the energy markets and the global markets for food commodities and also manufacturing commodities.

So like all of war, this war is particularly punishing of hardworking Arkansas families and families all over the world that depend on a lower cost for bread and a lower cost for gas.

So that's certainly one aspect of it.

Secondly, look, the United States has a commitment to Europe, and peace in Europe is important to the U.S. for our trade and prosperity, for our ability to sell our goods and services all over Europe and our supply chain for our critical industries here at home.

And so it's important that Putin be beaten here Stephen, we visited before this became as stark as it is now.

And after 50 days of fighting, I said, Putin has not paid a price, diplomatic, economic or military for the 22 years of aggressive leadership in Russia.

He crushed Chechen they crushed the border in Georgia.

He's destroyed Syria.

He's never felt a felt armed resistance until now.

The Ukrainian people and so that line has been drawn and for the betterment of here at home and for our our allies in Europe, we need to win this battle against Putin in Ukraine.

Is he paying the price now, Congressman?

This is he is this very expensive for him, too?

It is.

But let me say diplomatically, we use paid a strong price.

He's been repudiated at the United Nations in the General Assembly.

He's been kicked out of the Human Rights Council.

He's had the General Assembly at the U.N. set up an independent inquiry for war crimes against Putin and his government.

So diplomatically is paying a price.

Military early.

You see the price.

He's been defeated in Ukraine before this war started.

I think pundits would say Russia is the second best military in the world.

After 50 days of some people are saying maybe it's the second best military in Ukraine.

And then thirdly, economically, while he's been cut off from the world economic system and we're going to do more there, he has still earned over $30 billion equivalent from selling oil and gas in the past month.

And so unfortunately, unless we can completely encourage Europe and India and other countries to stop importing Russian gas and oil as soon as possible, he will still have his war machine financed by people buying his oil and gas.

There is rather some confusion right now, political confusion on the continent, especially.

So Prime Minister Johnson is having some difficulties.

Mr. Macron in France is under siege there from the far right.

There is some discord in Germany now, particularly in the post Merkel era.

Is Naito, is naito where it should be?

Steve, it's an important question, and I think Naito is is really And the EU, the European Union and Britain as a partner have never been more united today than by what they've witnessed in the Ukraine.

Here's the bottom line.

No one in Europe a few weeks ago expected to Putin to actually do this.

And that delayed the response of vigorous economic sanctions back in October or November as Putin built up troops.

And you still had people in denial in early February, despite U.S. intelligence saying that the attack on Ukraine was was imminent.

So I do think despite those domestic political challenges that you noted, that European partners have never been more united to support NATO example.

Germany is now committed to a 2% GDP in defense.

That had never happened since even when Jack Kennedy encouraged them to do that.

So we're making progress on unity and we need to keep it up because Europe needs to be at the forefront of obviously defending itself in the Atlantic partnership, assuming that can be maintained.

Sir, do you see a diplomatic solution or is this going to be inevitable?

Is it going to boil down to muscle?

I think muscle is critical here.

But if the Ukrainians can hold on and hold the Russians to a stalemate or defeat them in certain select arenas, that will give them the Ukrainians the credibility to go to the negotiating table.

And in my view and my great hope, eject Russia and preserve its sovereign borders, because that should be the objective.

We should hold true to the U.N. charter that no U.N. member attack a sovereign nation.

And that is what, relentlessly and as a butcher.

Putin has gone to the Ukraine.

It was unprovoked.

It's illegal, and it's just 22 years of despicable action by Putin, the leader of Russia.

We have just a few seconds remaining, sir.

Mr. Putin, this more on Friday morning sent a fairly stark warning to Washington.

Don't send any more aid.

Stop it.

Is he bluffing?

Well, I think we need to support the Ukrainians.

The Ukrainians are carrying this fight.

We don't know if he's bluffing or not, but he has galvanized Europe.

You have Finland and Sweden, two of his biggest neighbors who have been neutral for the past eight decades.

Are now going to join NATO's.

So Putin is in a box.

And we want to make sure that the Ukrainians win.

I've got to end it there, sir, because we're simply out of time.

And as always, we thank you for yours.

Come back safely.

All right.

Thank you.

And as always, we thank you for watching.

See you next week.

Support for Arkansas Week provided by the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.

The Arkansas Times and Q R FM 89.