Athens County Children Services

There is a sensory-friendly swim starting at Athens City Pool this Sunday, July 14th. This pilot program will run six weeks through August 18th from 11 am - 12 pm. There is no cost for admission.

Sponsored by SOCIL (Southeast Ohio Center for Independent Living), this pilot program offers a free hour of swimming to anyone with sensory challenges or a disability. Families and friends of those individuals can join them, also free of charge.

This is designed to enable families to be able to participate in one of our community's amazing resources who might not be able to otherwise. The public pool can be crowded, overstimulating, and even unsafe for some people with disabilities or other sensory processing disorders. Our hope is that this special time creates a safe and welcoming place for all individuals and families regardless of ability.

There will be two available spaces to enjoy the water during this time: the zero-entry pool and the splash pad. The lap lanes, water slide, and kiddy pool will not be available. The zero-entry pool will be open the entire hour without any interruptions of adult swim.

This is a pilot program. We encourage families who would benefit from this program to come out and enjoy this time. All families are welcome to stay beyond 12 pm and enjoy the rest of the pools when they open for the remainder of the day.

In order to participate, please sign in at the front desk when you arrive.

If you have any questions, please reach out to Davey McNelly, Executive Director of SOCIL, at [email protected] or the city pool manager at [email protected]

We are having a great time at the Glouster Community Day of Hope! Come on out to the Trimble Football field to see all the community resources, get some free food, and play a few games. We will be here until 4pm so come and enjoy this beautiful weather with us!

We are getting out to the locations for our second-to-last PB&J distribution day for 2024. We are going to be joined by Southern Ohio Copperheads players and staff at each location and they are helping us fill the blessing boxes in the Amesville, Coolville, and Hockingport locations.

We are also going to have the Athens City-County Health Department joining us out at The Plains community park location today to offer their mobile services.

Look forward to seeing everyone out there!

Hey everyone!

We are looking forward to hearing from our amazing community members about our new building, this evening at the Athens Public Library large meeting room, from 5:30pm - 7:30pm. Director Otis Crockron and the architect team from BDT Architects will be there with a short presentation and be available for questions afterward. We want to hear what you all would like to see with our new building and campus!

We will have some refreshments available for those who are able to make it. If you aren't able to make it, we will be streaming the meeting on Zoom at the below link and you will be able to type questions into chat that can be asked.

See you this evening!

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We are back with the Peanut Butter and Jelly project distribution after the Fourth of July holiday last week. We will be out at all our locations from 10am - 12pm today with peanut butter, jelly, bread, and fresh produce! It will be another hot day, so please stay hydrated and we will see you out there!

There will be no PB&J Distribution tomorrow as the agency will be closed for the 4th of July holiday. We hope everyone has a wonderful holiday and safe celebrations!

We will return on July 11th for the next distribution. We will be joined at our Alexander location by the Athens City-County Health Department who will have information and resources for those who want them. They will also be at The Plains location on July 18th and the Nelsonville location on July 25th. Come out and say hi!

Hi all,

We will be hosting a listening session on July 11th at the Athens Public Library large meeting room from 5:30pm - 7:30pm. It is open to the public.

We have contracted with BDT Architects to develop the concept and blueprint for a new building to replace our converted residential homes built in 1972. This new building will help modernize the agency and provide enhanced services to the public. As part of the building process, we would like to hear from the community regarding what they would like to see in a new building.

They will be hosting a panel discussion with a question and answer period for the public regarding their proposed new building. Director Otis Crockron and Don Dispenza from BDT Architects will be in attendance to hear from the public and answer questions regarding the new building and construction process. The panel discussion will take place at the Athens Public Library large meeting room.

For more information, please reach out to Matthew Starkey, Public Information Officer/Community Events Coordinator by email: [email protected] or by calling 740-592-3061 – ext. 307.

We are getting all loaded up for our PB&J distribution today. We will be out at our locations from 10am-12pm, so please come out if you need some peanut butter, jelly, bread, and fresh produce!

We stopped by TS Tech Americas, Inc to pickup their wonderful PB&J donation so we could have it ready for today! They support PB&J every year and we are so grateful to have their help.

Please note that we will not have a distribution next Thursday as it will be the 4th of July holiday.

Despite the heat, we had some fun loading up for our PB&J distribution today. Please come out and grab some peanut butter, jelly, bread, and fresh produce at any of our distribution locations listed on the flyer, today from 10am to 12pm. Make sure to stay cool and hydrated and we will see you out there!

We had a wonderful time getting the ribbon cut for our brand new mural! Thank you to everyone who came out for a front row seat to the most beautiful mural in Southeast Ohio! Thank you to muralist Mandi Caskey, and her assistant, Liv Morris, for painting such a beautiful mural. You both have made your mark on Athens County!

We were so happy to see all five of our pinwheel designers from each of our five high schools in Athens County show up and be able to sign their name on the mural and receive their original design signed by Mandi! We hope these children keep pursuing their artistic inspirations as they are already amazing artists!

Thank you to Ohio Department of Transportation Southeastern Ohio District 10, the City of Athens, Ohio - News and Information, and the Athens County Commissioners for your approval and support along the way to make this project a reality! ODOT District 10 Deputy Director Rich Oster had some kind words to say along with the City of Athens Service-Safety Deputy Director, Andrew Chiki.

A huge shoutout to Sherwin-Williams local rep., Anna Grueser, for all yours and your technician's work to help get that beautiful color on the wall.

We also wanted to thank Angela Sausser from Public Children Services Association of Ohio and Jeff Van Deusen from Ohio Department of Children and Youth for coming down to Athens County and speaking.

This project has been so fun to watch come to fruition and we hope our Athens County community is able to appreciate this beautiful artwork for many years to come. Our children are the future of our community and as always, we are here to fulfill our mission of protecting children, strengthening families, and securing futures!

The ribbon cutting ceremony for our mural will start at 10am, so in about an hour! We are looking forward to seeing everyone on our front lawn to celebrate such an amazing piece of artwork. The front lawn is accessible from our parking lot at 18 Stonybrook Drive, where there will be some parking, and the sidewalk off East State Street if you park on the far east side streets.

We will have some short speeches, followed by the ribbon cutting and a walk through viewing of the mural. See you all there in an hour!

We are underway for the 17th Annual Peanut Butter and Jelly Project! We will be out at our locations until 12:00pm, but don't worry if you are unable to make it today, we will be at those locations from 10am-12pm each Thursday in June and July, excluding July 4th.

We want to give a special shoutout to the Children's Hunger Alliance for donating $30,000 to make this years project a huge success. We also want to thank Community Food Initiatives and Snowville Creamery for, once again, donating fresh produce that we can give out to our families in need.

We love when Athens County comes together to help out those in our community who need it!

We've all enjoyed following along on the mural progress, but it will soon come to an end. As Mandi finishes up a few final details on the mural, we wanted to invite you all out to the official ribbon cutting this Friday, June 7th at 10am! This event is open to the public, so please come out if you are able to make it.

We will be on our front lawn (where we place our pinwheels each April), right next to the mural and have a short program where you can hear from the muralist and some of the folks involved with the mural. We will officially cut the ribbon and there will be a short walkthrough viewing of the mural for those who would like.

There will be some parking available on our agency property at 18 Stonybrook Drive, but please be respectful if parking on our property or any of the surrounding streets. There will be spots on our agency property that are reserved for official visitations occurring at this time so please pay attention to any signage directing you where to park or not to park. From our parking lot, there will be signs showing the walking path down to the front lawn where the event will be held and you are welcome to follow those down for the event.

We've enjoyed this process every step of the way and are looking forward to seeing you all this Friday, June 7th at 10am!

The mural is almost finished, and we have loved seeing it come to life, every day, right before our eyes! The detail on the children and their unique smiles has brought joy and happiness for most of us and we hope it has done the same for all who get to see it.

We’d be remiss if we didn’t mention that not all children in Athens County are smiling. Some children have been victims of abuse and neglect and have been removed from those environments. We always strive to work with families toward reunification and place children with kin while the safety issues are addressed. When a kinship placement is not there, we rely on our wonderful foster caregivers to provide a safe and loving home for these children as we work with their parents toward reunification.

May is Foster Care Month and we wanted to highlight that while our foster caregivers are some of the most dedicated, passionate, and loving people we know, we need more caregivers so we can keep our children in Athens County. Being a foster caregiver is not for everyone, but if you have ever considered becoming a foster caregiver, please take the initial step and reach out to our recruiter for more information about the process and what it takes to be a foster caregiver. You can use the following link and fill out the inquiry form to start the conversation:

https://family.binti.com/users/signup/athens-county-approvals

There is no pressure to continue the process of getting certified beyond where you are willing and able. If you are in search of a higher calling, however, there are children in Athens County who need loving and supportive homes and by becoming a foster caregiver, you can make a positive difference in the lives of children who are the future of our great community.

Look at how awesome those pinwheels look painted up on the mural!

For those who don't know, each pinwheel was designed by a child attending one of Athens County's five high schools. A winner from each high school was selected to be painted on the mural. Three are up so far and we can't wait to see the last two!

Also, some of you may recognize several familiar images represented on the mural. The child holding the peanut butter and jelly sandwich is a shoutout to our PB&J Project that we hold each summer in June and July. Some families rely on school lunches so the summer months can be a stressful time for some in our community. Our PB&J Project is our way of helping to alleviate some of this stress that families in our community face.

Please see our flyer for distribution locations and come join us to grab some peanut butter, jelly, bread, and fresh produce each Thursday in June and July (no distribution on July 4th) from 10am-12pm.

We just couldn't wait until tomorrow to update you all on the amazing progress of our mural!

Please enjoy these pictures of the stellar progress and all the little details that Mandi is adding to the mural. We also wanted to share the winning designs for the pinwheels as they have already put the base layer on for one of them! Each student who participated was given a sheet with two pinwheel outlines that they could design.

These pinwheels were submitted by each of our five high schools in Athens County and a winner was selected by Mandi, for each school, to be painted on the mural. We hope you enjoy seeing the creativity and artistic talent of our children as much as we have and we are very excited to see art from children in our community represented on this mural for years to come!

Hard to believe it has only been one week of painting!

Mandi and her assistant, Liv, have made some great progress already. We love seeing all the different stages of detail on the same canvas. Watching the happiness and confidence come out on these children's faces is truly impressive.

We have our fingers crossed for good weather this week so we can hopefully see much more color added to the canvas!

Keeps your eyes open as we will share the winning designs for the five pinwheels on the mural! All five of our Athens County high schools participated and returned some beautiful designs for Mandi to pick from. It means so much to use that we can include artwork made by children in Athens County for this mural and can't wait to see them painted up there!

Hey all,

For those who are unable to make it by the mural to see the amazing progress so far, we wanted to give you an update. It is truly amazing being able to watch Mandi put this up and add detail to the sections in real time.

She is starting with a base layer of paint and then going back to add detail with spray paint and we couldn't be more impressed with the level of artistic expression she is able to achieve. The shading, detail in the hair and eyes, and the overall beauty of the image after the spray paint is added, has us all electric thinking about what each section will look like as she moves through. We can't wait to continue watching her progress and, of course, see what the finished mural will look like.

We're hoping this rain passes quickly today and we hit a dry stretch through the weekend and into next week so we can see a lot more color go up on the wall!

We had these gentlemen from the Athens Elks Lodge #973 stop by the agency to make a generous contribution of $1,000 to this year's Peanut Butter and Jelly Project!

We will be out all over Athens County each Thursday in June and July (except the 4th of July) to distribute peanut butter, jelly, bread, and fresh produce to those who need it. See the flyer for details on distribution locations.

Each year, the PB&J Project helps struggling families get through the summer gap in school breakfasts and lunches, and community support from groups like the Athens Elks makes this project possible. Thank you for supporting children and families in our community!

Hey everyone!

You may have noticed a little work being done on the East State St./Route 33 Underpass. Last night, that work got a little bit clearer as muralist Mandi "Miss Birdy" Caskey put her outline on the wall of the mural she will be painting over the next several weeks.

We contracted with Mandi and have partnered with ODOT and the City of Athens to paint a mural on the north abutment of that underpass.

This mural will represent our history of protecting child welfare in Athens County and our recognition of all our community does for each other, and for our children. In the sketch, you will notice the Santa Tree Project and the Peanut Butter and Jelly Project. You will also notice a building in the middle, which is the old children's home that used to reside at that space before Route 33 was constructed. Of course, our pinwheels that we plant every April on our front lawn are also included.

Mandi spent last week visiting high schools in Athens County to talk about her process, give guidance and motivation to aspiring young artists, and provide them a task of designing their own pinwheels. She will select a winner from each of our county's five high schools and include those designs on the five pinwheels on the mural.

We will have more pictures to follow as we move along the process and all of you can follow along just by driving past and seeing her progress!

If you want to know more about Mandi, please visit her web site to see some of her past work: https://www.birdyco.com/

We wanted to highlight our open job postings for all those considering a fulfilling career in child welfare. You can scan the QR code on the posting or use the following link to get to our career portal and apply today!

https://www.infinityhr.com/extranet/recruiting.aspx?id=7371b17e-8515-473f-bf86-a1bd9e780545

The Red Cross is in urgent need of donors and we hosting a blood drive this Friday, May 10th, to help them get life saving donations to those who need them. If you are able, please consider using the following link to sign up for our blood drive and give the gift of life to someone in need!

https://www.redcrossblood.org/give.html/drive-results?zipSponsor=AthensCCS

We want to give a huge shoutout to the VFW Post 7174 - The Plains for donating over $1,000 of peanut butter and jelly along with 30 cases of Girl Scout cookies! We also want to give our thanks to the Piggly Wiggly for their help in making this donation possible.

Support from community groups like the VFW Post 7174 - The Plains and businesses like the Piggly Wiggly make the Peanut Butter and Jelly Project possible and help us get food assistance over the summer to those who need it in Athens County!

The Nelsonville-York Girl Power group, put on by our school outreach worker at the school, took a field trip to Tri-County Career Center this week. These children received manicures from Miss Jenny's cosmetology students and talked about different career options. Many of these students said they want to go to Tri-County when they're older.

Thanks to Jenny Daubenmire for this wonderful opportunity to see all the awesome classes and potential career options that Tri-County offers and getting our children to think about their futures!

Director Crockron was presenting at the Public Children Services Association of Ohio 2024 New Executives Orientation yesterday. He was sharing his insight as director and helping guide new executives at Public Children Services Agencies across Ohio as they tackle the challenges facing agencies and our workforce.

We had a wonderful time last night at the Ohio University Inn for our Champions for Children event. This is our capstone event in recognition of Child Abuse Prevention Month, where our staff nominates individuals from throughout our community who have given back to and lifted up children in Athens County. From those nominations, we selected the following four individuals for their efforts:

Jed Butcher - First United Methodist Church Athens Ohio
Monna French
Sam Jones
Gwen Mouat

You can find the writeups for each of these amazing individuals on this post and they all rightfully deserved the recognition they received. Their kind words from their speeches were inspirational and motivational while bringing a few tears to the room.

Our keynote speaker was our former executive director, Cathy Hill, and she sent us off into the night with a great speech and some beautiful poetry.

Thank you to all our community partners who took part in the evening and, of course, to our four Champions for Children who work tirelessly, every day, to give back to our Athens County community!

The Athens County Children Services Board also showed their support for Wear Blue Day when they took their picture at their March board meeting. We appreciate the guidance and support our wonderful board gives us and were happy to have them send us a picture to show their support for Child Abuse Prevention Month!

Our friends over at Holzer Health System wore blue on Wear Blue Day (April 10th) to show their support for Child Abuse Prevention Month. These kind and amazing individuals do such great work protecting and caring for our community and we were happy to have their support on Wear Blue Day!

Thank you Holzer Health System for your support for children and families in our wonderful Athens County community!

Governor DeWine and the Athens County Commissioners have both proclaimed April as Child Abuse Prevention Month. The pinwheels on our front lawn, right off East State Street, are representative of the referrals we receive from those individuals who are concerned with the welfare of children in our community. We are dependent on these referrals to be able to our our job of protecting children, so if you see something, please say something.

We are available and mandated to receive reports of alleged child abuse or neglect 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. If you suspect child abuse or neglect, contact us at (740) 592-3061, or in case of emergency at (740) 400-7059.

Mark your calendars and save the date! We are returning to Walter Fieldhouse on April 6th for another great day of fun and frivolity for our children and families!

Letters to vendors and sponsors will go out this week so be on the lookout if you are an organization interested in participating this year. If you are an organization who has never participated before or are interested in being a sponsor for the event, please reach out to [email protected] to receive more information.