Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, April 7, 1995                   TAG: 9504070039
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: B-1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: LESLIE TAYLOR STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

CHILD ADVOCATE PERCEIVES STRIDES - AND BACKLASH

Twenty years after passage of state legislation that created the Child Abuse and Neglect Act, Barbara Rawn applauds the advances in services to protect children and the public's heightened awareness.

But Rawn, executive director of Prevent Child Abuse, Virginia, senses a backlash, ``like we've gone too far and taken away parents' rights to discipline as they feel appropriate.''

``There is this belief that adults don't have the rights that they're supposed to have,'' Rawn said at a seminar this week in Roanoke to commemorate the act's 20th anniversary. ``We're in a tenuous position - backlash and fear for kids.''

There are increased claims of false reports, ``grumblings'' about false-memory syndrome, and proposals for state legislation to give parents the right to raise and educate their children as they wish, without government involvement, Rawn said.

Last weekend, the Virginia Department of Social Services complied with a court order to purge the names of people suspected of abusing or neglecting children and their alleged victims.

``What's going to happen to these kids?'' Rawn asked.

What's needed is more focus on prevention, she said.

``With prevention, there won't be any need for backlash because we won't be having child abuse and neglect,'' Rawn said. ``We just have to pluck away at the prevention piece. We can't make enough Band-Aids to cover the wounds of child abuse. We've got to prevent it up front.''

In the 1992-93 fiscal year:

n36,460 reports of suspected child abuse were made in Virginia, an increase of 2.5 percent from fiscal 1991-92;

n9,700 of those reports were substantiated, 276 more than fiscal 1991-92;

n43 children died from abuse or neglect, 11 more than fiscal 1991-92;

n3,601 caretakers were reported to law enforcement officials for possible criminal investigation and prosecution.

Attention must be focused on families where abuse has already occurred and on children who have already been victims, and services need to be provided to families earlier, before problems become severe, said Rita Katzman, Child Protective Services program manager for the state Department of Social Services.