The Women Behind the Children
BY KRISTEN SPRACHER-BIRTWHISTLE
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The Women Behind the Children
As she speaks, she has the energetic zeal of a happy, well-grounded mother. She is attractive, articulate, and hooked on drugs. “In the last twelve years I don’t ever remember taking any of my six children trick-or-treating, taking their hands and walking them through the neighborhood on Halloween night. I never made them costumes or shared the evening with them – instead I was crouched in a corner, too high on meth.” This shared experience is not uncommon in the hallways of the Child Abuse Prevention Council’s (CAPC) First Step Children’s Center, a unique organization dedicated to advocating for children, while tirelessly working to prevent abuse, neglect and the cycle of violence that follows far too many families in San Joaquin County – a county where nine children are reported abused each day.
What you also hear in the hallways of CAPC is the sound of laughter and children’s quick footsteps. You hear singing and see game playing. For many of these children, this is the first sweet taste of childhood happiness, caring and compassion at the hands of adults some of these children have ever known. An amazing staff – whose gift is helping and healing the spirit of small broken souls and educating parents on how to be better parents – graces the two-story building named after its legendary founder, the late Judge Sandra-Butler Smith – a pioneering advocate in preserving and advocating for the rights of children.
The strength and success of CAPC can be attributed to several women leaders, the women behind the children. Four women, uniquely different and diverse, but sharing a common bond and backbone, have been the engines behind CAPC. Lindy Turner-Hardin, executive director of CAPC, Charlynn Harless, CEO of Legacy Enterprises and CAPC board member, Stacey Carter, preschool-age teacher, and Stephanie McCoy, program director, are all catalysts for child services reform, for prevention education, and for advocacy for all children and parents as well. Their collective and intense passion to improving the lives of families is a daily task that they perform with exuberance and certitude. They are distinguished in that they speak freely of how to change the human condition, and what needs to be done to extend hope to families in order to create a new generation where violence and abuse, both physical and verbal, is no longer a traditional home condition. Their actions illuminate hope for families who are lost in neglectful life situations. Their collective strength and persistence can be compared to a brick wall – nothing stops them from their mission to prevent child abuse.
Lindy Turner-Hardin began her tenure with CAPC five years ago, during a time when the organization was suffering from financial challenges, internal system flaws and limited community support. CAPC was on the brink of closure. What Lindy has done is nothing short of transformational. During these past years, she has been the change agent at the helm who has catapulted the agency into a $1.9M “business” with over 30 employees and a wide-ranging menu of social services that help families. Her tenacity and extraordinary dedication to San Joaquin County and its children allowed for the construction of the 15,000-square-foot First Step Children’s Center that serves over 65 children each day, provides a round-the-clock crisis hotline, and offers parenting programs, intervention services, and child and family therapy to hundreds.
Upon first glance you would think that Lindy is better suited to sitting in a corporate boardroom or pitching a new venture to a Fortune 500 company, but once you hear her speak, you know she means business in taking charge and control of the matter of protecting children and helping parents. Her affluence and ever-present public relations persona has galvanized major community donors, contributors and a long list of grants that has allowed the Center to be financially solvent, even during difficult economic times. The First Step program is more than daycare. It boosts services to over 700 children and families annually. Her singular vision has been to develop a center of excellence for children and families in distress, and to promote a model of prevention education and therapy that will give families the seeds for successful living in a much more harmonious environment. As Lindy confesses, people do not generally want to abuse their kids. It’s lack of education, stressors at various points in time; it’s cultural, poverty and lack of food in the home. Transportation is also a challenge. So many parents are restricted by the inability to seek services due to lack of transportation. Lindy’s role is to break down those barriers and ensure that needy families can access services. Her leadership style is inviting and relational. She often speaks of the strong partnerships that exist amongst the local non-profits where collaboration, not competition for resources, is the norm. Those joint affiliations are the key to beating back the odds when families are falling on tough times, lack education or cannot find transportation to obtain much-needed services.
While leadership in support of the agency’s mission and vision is the focal point for Lindy, she is also a proponent of mentoring other women. A major tenet of Lindy’s work philosophy is to explore the possibility of how women can grow to be effective leaders. “I believe that when given an opportunity, motivated women grab it and grow!” This has been evident in the CAPC staffs who are encouraged to continue their education, and grow professionally. “My mantra as a manager is ‘always exhaust your possibilities!’ I encourage staff to bring their challenges to me, but don’t forget to bring solutions as well. Finding ways for women to take ownership is key as well.”
Another staunch CAPC advocate is Charlynn Harless. Helen Keller once stated that the most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched. They must be felt with the heart. Charlynn, whose volunteer spirit is contagious, is another great women leader within the CAPC ranks. She is the heart and rhythmic pulse of the organization. Charlynn is single-minded in her convictions to prevent child abuse, and is never afraid to open a door and look at what is behind it.
An award-winning philanthropic leader and successful businesswomen, she is a 14-year board member of CAPC. Charlynn has devoted thousands of hours of her time, money and connectivity to other leaders in the community to see that no child is ever left behind. “It is my belief that our children’s welfare is of greatest importance. Not just because it is the right thing to do, but because we are building our society through the children we raise.” Her decades-plus commitment to preventing abuse began when in 1977, where when working for the Public Defender’s office, she typed a brief in defense of a couple who were charged with murdering their 3-year-old daughter, Latanya Smith, who was pronounced dead on Valentines Day, 1977 at the hand of her mother’s boyfriend. The report detailed how the young girl had been tortured while the mother sat by and watched. The toddler’s death certificate read “cause of death… a broken heart.” “I was devastated and hated the fact that I was contributing to getting these cruel people off, and I quit my job as a result,” says Charlynn. That experience was also the time of conception when CAPC’s founder, Judge Sandra Butler Smith – who tried the murder case of the abused toddler – created the idea for the CAPC model. For Charlynn, that intense, emotionally compelling situation motivated her to delve into a lifetime of servitude to protecting children through education and reform. She states, “I can’t help myself when it comes to the kids. I cannot bear to have children live in fear in a home that is at risk. The height of our success as an organization would be to have these kids return to CAPC as young adults so they can mentor others and support those who are now living under the veil of violence.”
Stacey Carter has over 60 children. She is the first face many CAPC clients see. Each morning “Stacey’s children” enter through the agency doors toward a welcoming and warm environment filled with a rainbow of bright artwork, miniature tables and chairs, and fanciful games and toys to start their days. The small elite army of co-workers who aid Stacey are members of her team.
As she runs alongside the delightfully squealing children in the colorful playground at CAPC, you can see her powerful passion for children. She is both protector and educator, substitute mother and guardian to each. While reading to a young boy with long eyelashes, curly black hair and a mischievous broad smile, she has two other small children grabbing at her for her attention and approval. The playground is her court, and she is the queen. She is also the frontline defense and support for the children who come to CAPC for routine daycare.
When meeting Stacey, what you first notice are her striking ocean blue eyes – they blur with tears as she speaks of why the work that she does is so critical. She came to CAPC after a short career with Head Start, shyly noting that she took a pay cut to come to CAPC. Her reasoning to join CAPC was that she wanted to work with children who were at even higher risk for violence. Stacey has no fear of challenges or of encountering the sometimes heart-wrenching stories of the babies, toddlers and young teens that frequent CAPC. Her goal is to effect change in each and every child by connecting with them on some unique level where they begin to be responsive.
“On the first day I started I had a little boy, five years old, that was out of control, violent to himself and to others. He was a handful,” recalls Stacey. “He was from a family where the mother had been stabbed by her boyfriend, where domestic violence was commonplace, and where profanity was common language – he knew of nothing different in his young life.
He had been expelled from kindergarten, from Head Start, but we started to make progress. We started to see this child begin to respond.” Stacey’s leadership in this young boy’s life allowed him to regain control of his anger and hostility. Today, he is in the third grade, in foster care and out of harm’s way, and is doing very well in school.
Rejuvenating a life that has seen more beatings than birthday parties, more rage and anger than feeling the warmth of a mother’s hug, is a regular road for many of these children. Stacey sorrowfully states, the hard part is seeing the children move on. “I believe in my heart, that in the years to come as he becomes an adult, that young child and others will remember us and how we helped him.”
Stephanie McCoy, program director for CAPC, wanted to help people become better equipped at raising their children. Stephanie is a pillar of strength at CAPC, and the right-hand of the executive director. She exudes a confidence and conviction that makes you stand up and take notice – she has a global vision for the fight against child abuse. She has a doggedness and resolve to advance the programs of CAPC and to create a multitude of services that speaks to all ages, making it a one-stop shop for child support services. While her vision is a lofty one, you believe that if anyone can make it happen, it is she.
She started with CAPC in 2004, after 12 years in childcare and social services settings, and has been promoted through the agency ranks. She is currently in the process of obtaining her Licensed Clinical Social Work degree and becoming certified in parent-child interaction therapy programs.
“There is so much more that we can do for our community and our families.” She barely takes a breath as she scrolls through a long list of programs and services that are provided to the community from CAPC. “We need a place where kids can go when they don’t feel safe. We know that many parents abuse their children, because they were abused themselves. We provide them with therapy and coaching, so rational decisions spring to life.”
Having a centralized system where all child and family services are blended would be a dream for Stephanie. “We need to be right there with our parents, not in front of them or behind them, but side by side.” Because her role allows her to lead the programs that the agency offers, she also takes time to lead the staff. “I have been able to strengthen the staff by taking them under my wings and showing them the ropes. If I am able to strengthen other women, they in turn will strengthen someone else. Thus, the network of female leadership grows.”
While their titles and roles are different, the four women leaders – Lindy, Charlynn, Stacey and Stephanie, who support the multiple services and programs of CAPC, are role models for other women. They are servant leaders in the greatest sense of the term, and have assumed an enormous level of responsibility, have sacrificed much for the gain of others, and are enterprising to the core. Through their leadership, young minds peel away the layers of physical and emotional abuse, revealing a light that cannot be diminished, allowing families to stop the repetitive nature of violence, to heal, find harmony and a sense of balance in their lives.
For now the foundation and future of CAPC is firm. The future goal is to ensure sustainability, so the agency can continue to expand services long-term. “Many days, sitting at my desk while poring over the budget and wondering how to make things work, I hear the children laughing on the playground… this is fuel for my fire,” states Lindy. “We are not in the business of selling widgets; we are in the business of selling strong families.” If you could quantify the return on investment from non-profits who help build strong families, it would be priceless.
The evidence is clear that the strong network of women who constitute the frame of CAPC truly do make a difference. Their legacy will be felt for generations to come. And the mother whose children never had a Halloween due to her addiction from methamphetamine? She has been drug-free for over a year, has a home, and for the first time, she and her husband took all six children, even the one-year-old, trick-or-treating. The spirits of these great women leaders from CAPC were with her.
What you also hear in the hallways of CAPC is the sound of laughter and children’s quick footsteps. You hear singing and see game playing. For many of these children, this is the first sweet taste of childhood happiness, caring and compassion at the hands of adults some of these children have ever known. An amazing staff – whose gift is helping and healing the spirit of small broken souls and educating parents on how to be better parents – graces the two-story building named after its legendary founder, the late Judge Sandra-Butler Smith – a pioneering advocate in preserving and advocating for the rights of children.
The strength and success of CAPC can be attributed to several women leaders, the women behind the children. Four women, uniquely different and diverse, but sharing a common bond and backbone, have been the engines behind CAPC. Lindy Turner-Hardin, executive director of CAPC, Charlynn Harless, CEO of Legacy Enterprises and CAPC board member, Stacey Carter, preschool-age teacher, and Stephanie McCoy, program director, are all catalysts for child services reform, for prevention education, and for advocacy for all children and parents as well. Their collective and intense passion to improving the lives of families is a daily task that they perform with exuberance and certitude. They are distinguished in that they speak freely of how to change the human condition, and what needs to be done to extend hope to families in order to create a new generation where violence and abuse, both physical and verbal, is no longer a traditional home condition. Their actions illuminate hope for families who are lost in neglectful life situations. Their collective strength and persistence can be compared to a brick wall – nothing stops them from their mission to prevent child abuse.
Lindy Turner-Hardin began her tenure with CAPC five years ago, during a time when the organization was suffering from financial challenges, internal system flaws and limited community support. CAPC was on the brink of closure. What Lindy has done is nothing short of transformational. During these past years, she has been the change agent at the helm who has catapulted the agency into a $1.9M “business” with over 30 employees and a wide-ranging menu of social services that help families. Her tenacity and extraordinary dedication to San Joaquin County and its children allowed for the construction of the 15,000-square-foot First Step Children’s Center that serves over 65 children each day, provides a round-the-clock crisis hotline, and offers parenting programs, intervention services, and child and family therapy to hundreds.
Upon first glance you would think that Lindy is better suited to sitting in a corporate boardroom or pitching a new venture to a Fortune 500 company, but once you hear her speak, you know she means business in taking charge and control of the matter of protecting children and helping parents. Her affluence and ever-present public relations persona has galvanized major community donors, contributors and a long list of grants that has allowed the Center to be financially solvent, even during difficult economic times. The First Step program is more than daycare. It boosts services to over 700 children and families annually. Her singular vision has been to develop a center of excellence for children and families in distress, and to promote a model of prevention education and therapy that will give families the seeds for successful living in a much more harmonious environment. As Lindy confesses, people do not generally want to abuse their kids. It’s lack of education, stressors at various points in time; it’s cultural, poverty and lack of food in the home. Transportation is also a challenge. So many parents are restricted by the inability to seek services due to lack of transportation. Lindy’s role is to break down those barriers and ensure that needy families can access services. Her leadership style is inviting and relational. She often speaks of the strong partnerships that exist amongst the local non-profits where collaboration, not competition for resources, is the norm. Those joint affiliations are the key to beating back the odds when families are falling on tough times, lack education or cannot find transportation to obtain much-needed services.
While leadership in support of the agency’s mission and vision is the focal point for Lindy, she is also a proponent of mentoring other women. A major tenet of Lindy’s work philosophy is to explore the possibility of how women can grow to be effective leaders. “I believe that when given an opportunity, motivated women grab it and grow!” This has been evident in the CAPC staffs who are encouraged to continue their education, and grow professionally. “My mantra as a manager is ‘always exhaust your possibilities!’ I encourage staff to bring their challenges to me, but don’t forget to bring solutions as well. Finding ways for women to take ownership is key as well.”
Another staunch CAPC advocate is Charlynn Harless. Helen Keller once stated that the most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched. They must be felt with the heart. Charlynn, whose volunteer spirit is contagious, is another great women leader within the CAPC ranks. She is the heart and rhythmic pulse of the organization. Charlynn is single-minded in her convictions to prevent child abuse, and is never afraid to open a door and look at what is behind it.
An award-winning philanthropic leader and successful businesswomen, she is a 14-year board member of CAPC. Charlynn has devoted thousands of hours of her time, money and connectivity to other leaders in the community to see that no child is ever left behind. “It is my belief that our children’s welfare is of greatest importance. Not just because it is the right thing to do, but because we are building our society through the children we raise.” Her decades-plus commitment to preventing abuse began when in 1977, where when working for the Public Defender’s office, she typed a brief in defense of a couple who were charged with murdering their 3-year-old daughter, Latanya Smith, who was pronounced dead on Valentines Day, 1977 at the hand of her mother’s boyfriend. The report detailed how the young girl had been tortured while the mother sat by and watched. The toddler’s death certificate read “cause of death… a broken heart.” “I was devastated and hated the fact that I was contributing to getting these cruel people off, and I quit my job as a result,” says Charlynn. That experience was also the time of conception when CAPC’s founder, Judge Sandra Butler Smith – who tried the murder case of the abused toddler – created the idea for the CAPC model. For Charlynn, that intense, emotionally compelling situation motivated her to delve into a lifetime of servitude to protecting children through education and reform. She states, “I can’t help myself when it comes to the kids. I cannot bear to have children live in fear in a home that is at risk. The height of our success as an organization would be to have these kids return to CAPC as young adults so they can mentor others and support those who are now living under the veil of violence.”
Stacey Carter has over 60 children. She is the first face many CAPC clients see. Each morning “Stacey’s children” enter through the agency doors toward a welcoming and warm environment filled with a rainbow of bright artwork, miniature tables and chairs, and fanciful games and toys to start their days. The small elite army of co-workers who aid Stacey are members of her team.
As she runs alongside the delightfully squealing children in the colorful playground at CAPC, you can see her powerful passion for children. She is both protector and educator, substitute mother and guardian to each. While reading to a young boy with long eyelashes, curly black hair and a mischievous broad smile, she has two other small children grabbing at her for her attention and approval. The playground is her court, and she is the queen. She is also the frontline defense and support for the children who come to CAPC for routine daycare.
When meeting Stacey, what you first notice are her striking ocean blue eyes – they blur with tears as she speaks of why the work that she does is so critical. She came to CAPC after a short career with Head Start, shyly noting that she took a pay cut to come to CAPC. Her reasoning to join CAPC was that she wanted to work with children who were at even higher risk for violence. Stacey has no fear of challenges or of encountering the sometimes heart-wrenching stories of the babies, toddlers and young teens that frequent CAPC. Her goal is to effect change in each and every child by connecting with them on some unique level where they begin to be responsive.
“On the first day I started I had a little boy, five years old, that was out of control, violent to himself and to others. He was a handful,” recalls Stacey. “He was from a family where the mother had been stabbed by her boyfriend, where domestic violence was commonplace, and where profanity was common language – he knew of nothing different in his young life.
He had been expelled from kindergarten, from Head Start, but we started to make progress. We started to see this child begin to respond.” Stacey’s leadership in this young boy’s life allowed him to regain control of his anger and hostility. Today, he is in the third grade, in foster care and out of harm’s way, and is doing very well in school.
Rejuvenating a life that has seen more beatings than birthday parties, more rage and anger than feeling the warmth of a mother’s hug, is a regular road for many of these children. Stacey sorrowfully states, the hard part is seeing the children move on. “I believe in my heart, that in the years to come as he becomes an adult, that young child and others will remember us and how we helped him.”
Stephanie McCoy, program director for CAPC, wanted to help people become better equipped at raising their children. Stephanie is a pillar of strength at CAPC, and the right-hand of the executive director. She exudes a confidence and conviction that makes you stand up and take notice – she has a global vision for the fight against child abuse. She has a doggedness and resolve to advance the programs of CAPC and to create a multitude of services that speaks to all ages, making it a one-stop shop for child support services. While her vision is a lofty one, you believe that if anyone can make it happen, it is she.
She started with CAPC in 2004, after 12 years in childcare and social services settings, and has been promoted through the agency ranks. She is currently in the process of obtaining her Licensed Clinical Social Work degree and becoming certified in parent-child interaction therapy programs.
“There is so much more that we can do for our community and our families.” She barely takes a breath as she scrolls through a long list of programs and services that are provided to the community from CAPC. “We need a place where kids can go when they don’t feel safe. We know that many parents abuse their children, because they were abused themselves. We provide them with therapy and coaching, so rational decisions spring to life.”
Having a centralized system where all child and family services are blended would be a dream for Stephanie. “We need to be right there with our parents, not in front of them or behind them, but side by side.” Because her role allows her to lead the programs that the agency offers, she also takes time to lead the staff. “I have been able to strengthen the staff by taking them under my wings and showing them the ropes. If I am able to strengthen other women, they in turn will strengthen someone else. Thus, the network of female leadership grows.”
While their titles and roles are different, the four women leaders – Lindy, Charlynn, Stacey and Stephanie, who support the multiple services and programs of CAPC, are role models for other women. They are servant leaders in the greatest sense of the term, and have assumed an enormous level of responsibility, have sacrificed much for the gain of others, and are enterprising to the core. Through their leadership, young minds peel away the layers of physical and emotional abuse, revealing a light that cannot be diminished, allowing families to stop the repetitive nature of violence, to heal, find harmony and a sense of balance in their lives.
For now the foundation and future of CAPC is firm. The future goal is to ensure sustainability, so the agency can continue to expand services long-term. “Many days, sitting at my desk while poring over the budget and wondering how to make things work, I hear the children laughing on the playground… this is fuel for my fire,” states Lindy. “We are not in the business of selling widgets; we are in the business of selling strong families.” If you could quantify the return on investment from non-profits who help build strong families, it would be priceless.
The evidence is clear that the strong network of women who constitute the frame of CAPC truly do make a difference. Their legacy will be felt for generations to come. And the mother whose children never had a Halloween due to her addiction from methamphetamine? She has been drug-free for over a year, has a home, and for the first time, she and her husband took all six children, even the one-year-old, trick-or-treating. The spirits of these great women leaders from CAPC were with her.