[Congressional Record Volume 150, Number 115 (Wednesday, September 22, 2004)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1677]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




   SALUTE TO ROBIN STONE AND THE D.C. CHILDREN'S ADVOCACY CENTER FOR 
                      COMBATING CHILD SEXUAL ABUSE

                                 ______
                                 

                       HON. ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON

                      of the district of columbia

                    in the house of representatives

                     Wednesday, September 22, 2004

  Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to salute accomplished 
journalist and author Ms. Robin D. Stone for her courageous and 
thoughtful efforts to bring light to darkness by educating and raising 
public awareness about the heinous crime of child sexual abuse. I also 
want to acknowledge the outstanding work of my constituent Safe 
Shores--the D.C. Children's Advocacy Center in its front line work to 
support physically and sexually abused children and thank the Center 
for bringing Ms. Stone to the District of Columbia to give the plenary 
address at its second annual multidisciplinary conference: ``Safe 
Childhoods: Strengthening D.C.'s Clinical Response to Childhood 
Trauma.''
  Safe Shores is the coordinating agency for the District of Columbia's 
multidisciplinary team for child abuse investigation and prosecution, 
which is known as the MDT. As a not-for-profit organization Safe Shores 
works in a unique public-private partnership with the agencies that 
comprise the District's MDT, which are the Metropolitan Police 
Department, Child and Family Services Agency, the Office of the 
Attorney General for the District of Columbia, the U.S. Attorney's 
Office for the District of Columbia, and Children's National Medical 
Center. Safe Shores--The D.C. Children's Advocacy Center was founded 
for the express purpose of reducing the trauma of child victims of 
abuse during the investigative and prosecutorial processes. Safe Shores 
operates pursuant to the children's advocacy center developed back in 
the late 1980's by our esteemed colleague Representative Robert ``Bud'' 
Cramer of Alabama when he was a prosecutor.
  As part of its work, Safe Shores provides training and education on 
child abuse prevention and treatment for local professionals. It is in 
this context that Robin Stone has brought her vital message to my 
hometown, Washington DC, to shine light on what some would like to keep 
hidden in the shadows, child sexual abuse. Bravely using her own 
personal history of abuse as a catalyst for her journalistic treatment 
of this issue, Ms. Stone is the author of No Secrets, No Lies: How 
Black Families Can Heal from Sexual Abuse, published by Doubleday/
Broadway Books earlier this year.
  Ms. Stone brings an illustrious professional history to this 
important cause. She is a 2004 Casey Fellow, one of 30 journalists 
sponsored by the Casey Journalism Center on Children and Families to 
attend its five-day seminar ``Condition Critical: Covering Children's 
Health.'' A 2002-03 Kaiser Media Fellow, she was one of six journalists 
selected by the Kaiser Family Foundation to research and report on 
health issues. Her fellowship project was sexual abuse in Black 
families. Ms. Stone was founding editor in chief of essence.com, the 
interactive version of the premiere African-American women's magazine, 
Essence. She joined the magazine in September 1997 as a senior editor 
and ultimately was appointed executive editor. Before joining Essence, 
Ms. Stone was deputy editor of The Living Section at The New York 
Times. She came to The Times from The Boston Globe, where she was an 
editor in the living/arts department.
  I commend Ms. Stone for the courage and eloquence she has shown in 
bringing this issue before the American people. We know she has 
performed an invaluable public service in so doing. Indeed, Dr. Alvin 
F. Poussaint, preeminent child psychiatrist and professor at Harvard 
Medical School, has commented that ``No Secrets, No Lies breaks the 
silence about sexual abuse within the Black community . . . [and] Robin 
Stone makes a major contribution to the well-being of Black children 
and families.''
  Robin Stone's professional success and her personal fulfillment as a 
wife and mother exemplify that child sexual abuse does not have to 
determine the life course of those who are victims of this vile crime. 
Indeed, there is tremendous power, triumph and inspiration to be found 
in the survivor's story. So, it behooves those of us who make and shape 
the laws and who care about building a safer and saner society to 
listen, learn and heed the lessons from these survivors and the 
professionals who seek to help them heal and move beyond the pain. 
Paying attention to the issues raised in No Secrets, No Lies is our 
challenge and responsibility if we are to keep our promises to 
children, that is, to protect every child from abuse and ensure that 
all children--regardless of what family they are born to--have a safe, 
healthy and happy childhood.

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