While our building is intentionally designed as a house to provide a safe and welcoming atmosphere, WCCAC is not a shelter. We are a Children’s Advocacy Center (CAC), located in Georgetown, TX serving Williamson County.

Interested in learning more about the intentional design of our building? Click Here 

The criminal justice system, primarily designed for adult perpetrators and not child victims, often lacks coordination between police, prosecution, mental health, and medical agencies. So, without Child Advocacy Centers, children are often “re-victimized” through unnecessary and repetitive interviews due to each agency’s independent process. Because of this a duplication of efforts between the various departments existed while also complicating the information for the child’s case in an already complex legal system. For this purpose, CACs help overcome these problems by reducing child trauma and enhancing the investigation, thus resulting in improved lives for child victims and a higher number of convictions for offenders.

WCCAC serves children who are victims of child abuse or who have witnessed a violent crime. Child abuse includes, but is not limited to, sexual abuse, child sex trafficking, physical abuse and neglect. 

While child abuse happens to the child, the trauma happens to the family. So, siblings and immediate family members may also be eligible for services.

While CASA and CAC’S can often serve the same children, these programs are designed for different reasons. 

A Children’s Advocacy Center (CAC) serves to be a safe, child-friendly place for children to disclose the trauma they endured. Alleged victims are brought to a CAC by DFPS or law enforcement, so that services can be coordinated with partner agencies in a Multi-Disciplinary Team (MDT) approach in order to help these children and their non-offending family members cope, heal and move forward from the abuse and the trauma that results.

Whereas the CASA program serves to advocate for children’s “best interests” in the foster care system. They help to ensure that the children’s medical, physical, educational, and emotional needs are being met while they are in the foster care system.