Our Story
Our story began 16 years ago when a Forensic Nurse Examiner at Mary Washington Healthcare realized there had to be a better way to serve our community’s children who had been victimized by sexual or physical abuse. At the time, a child who experienced abuse would have to be ushered from institution to institution, retelling their experience to numerous strangers, ultimately increasing their trauma and pain. But we knew it could be better for these children.
Formed in 2008, Safe Harbor Child Advocacy Center (CAC) is the only 501(c)(3) CAC serving planning district 16 and the eastern side of the County of Orange. The center serves as a safe, centralized location for the coordinated community response to child victims of alleged abuse and neglect and their non-offending caregivers. Through the support of our compassionate and socially concerned donors, we provide multidisciplinary team (MDT) coordination, child forensic services, and mental health services to nearly 400 children each year.
Children are provided with the utmost care when they come to
Safe Harbor.
We help ease their fears and initiate their healing. From our highly trained forensic interviewers and forensic nurses to our child and family advocates and mental health therapists, everyone our children come into contact with is there to listen and let the child guide them through the process. Often, the first step towards a child’s healing is for them to experience the relief of having someone hear, understand, and believe them.
Our Vision
Our vision is to free children of the trauma that stems from abuse in an environment of warmth, trust, acceptance, and physical and emotional healing. Through collaboration and cooperation with our MDTs and the community, children can resume their childhood as the people they want and deserve to be.
Organization Leadership
In the face of increasing needs, we declared bold goals through 2022: expansion of mental health services for children impacted by abuse, expansion of our physical space to include a mental health suite, strengthening support and training for our multidisciplinary teams, and increasing awareness of child abuse through the first SAVE JANE event in Virginia.
We know there is much we can do together to improve the safety, health, and well-being of our children — and that begins with giving them voice, hope, and healing.
Major Troy J. Skebo, President 
Spotsylvania County Sheriff’s Office
Beth R. Girone, Vice President
Assistant Director
Department of Social Services, City of Fredericksburg
Jacqueline Brett, Secretary
Special Programs Coordinator
Department of Social Services, Spotsylvania County
Travis Bird, Director
Assistant Director of Education & Engagement
National District Attorneys Association
Lauren Buffum, Director
Vice President
Virginia National Bank
Angelina Campbell, RN, Director
Mary Washington Healthcare
Bill Carroll, Director
Production Director with Centennial Broadcasting
Special Investigator, U. S. Department of Defense
Alicia Conrad, BS, RN, FN-CSP, Director
Mary Washington Healthcare
Susan Fines, Director
Elementary School Principal (retired)
Spotsylvania County
Ahuna R. Johnson, Esquire, Director
Select Law
Lt. Bob Parsons, Director
Stafford County Sheriff’s Office
Stephanie Terrell, Director
Director of Compliance & Human Rights
Rappahannock Area Community Services Board
Elizabeth McNally, MSW
Executive Director
