There’s a new space in the Centre County Courthouse in Bellefonte for children who need to go to court proceedings. Judges invited the public to a dedication ceremony Wednesday afternoon to see the space and learn where the idea got started.
Amy Frank is the founder and the director of The Makery of Central Pennsylvania, a non-profit art studio. But she also volunteers at Stormbreak, a foster group home for girls aged 12-to-19.
“One Saturday morning about a year ago, two of the young women that live at Stormbreak were kind of upset and I asked them what was wrong. And they said, ‘Well, we have to go to court this week. And it's terrible,'" Frank said.
Frank said the two young women didn’t want to wait for a long time in the hallways. She said they were also worried about who they might run into there, like estranged family members going to court.
That’s why Frank partnered with the Centre County United Way to get funding for a dedicated children's waiting room. She used her experience from The Makery to design the room, along with help from an interior designer trained in making stress-reducing spaces with muted colors and soft chairs.
“And then we put out an Amazon wishlist to the whole community. And people bought hundreds of toys and decorations and art supplies and books for the space. And so we can't even believe it. It’s like, it's really fitting that it's the holiday season because it feels like Christmas in there," Frank said.
Barbara Sherlock is the chair of the Centre County United Way’s "Women United" group, which provided the grant to create the children's space. She said the grant was somewhere between $6,000-7,000 to renovate what used to be a conference room. She said the group was happy to support the space, especially since it reminded them of their help financing the Child Access Center in the past. That service offered a safe location for custody exchanges between separated parents and their children.
“Children are generally not responsible for their situation," Sherlock said. "They need the most positive situation they can get to learn how to deal with that, and to be able to deal with it effectively. They're not in a position to provide that for themselves."
Katherine Oliver is a judge in the Centre County Court of Common Pleas. She said the courthouse is one of the oldest in the state and called it a beautiful building, but that it was not built with children in mind.
"The fact of the matter is that today in our world that we live in now, there are a substantial portion of our cases that involve children. And in fact, there are a large number of cases that have circumstances in which the law requires that we bring those children to court," Oliver said.
Oliver said judges often have to get testimony from children, which can be difficult if they’re feeling anxious. The new children's waiting room is just a short walk from the courtroom for when judges need to bring children in to give testimony.
“Obviously, they'll be there with their caregivers and, you know, it allows them to be in a kind of reduced anxiety state while they're waiting for court. And the hope is, and I think that actually evidence bears this out, it leads to a better, more effective court process," Oliver said.
Oliver hopes more counties across the state will adopt this model to make the court process less traumatic for children. She noted recent email communications from other county courthouses.
"There were only a handful of counties that mentioned having a child space like we are about to open here here today. So that's despite the fact that there really is a general recognition that having a calm, child friendly environment can help reduce anxiety, it makes the process less traumatic for them, and overall, more effective in terms of the court process," Oliver said. "I think that we'll see more and more counties getting on board. I am proud. I hope you're all proud to be kind of at the forefront of those efforts."
The Allegheny County Courts celebrated the opening of a "trauma-informed courthouse" in Oct. 2023, which also looks to make the court process less traumatic for children.
