APPLETON, WI (WTAQ) — If you drive by Harbor House on West Fifth Street in Appleton it’ll be hard to miss the over 800 pinwheels set up right outside.
It’s all to raise awareness for Child Abuse and Neglect Month. Jennifer Sailer is with Outagamie County Children, Youth, an Families and says each of the pinwheels represents a family they’ve helped in 2020.
“We had 803 families that we served last year,” Sailer told WTAQ. “That’s the number we’re highlighting.”
It’s a number that’s troubling for the organization, too. At the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, reports of child abuse dropped significantly, but Sailer says that’s because the number one mandatory reporting group, school teachers, no longer had access to students.
“Although there was a reduction in the number of reports, I don’t know that there was a decrease in the number of occurrences in our community,” Sailer told WTAQ. “It was more that we weren’t getting that information.”
Melissa Blom is also with the group. She says the social isolation wrought from the COVID-19 pandemic made things worse for a lot of children suffering from abuse and neglect.
“Domestic violence and drugs in our community have really impacted children,” Blom said. “I really think that the pandemic resulted in more violence.”
The pinwheels will be up at Harbor House until April 9th.
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