— Daily Freeman-Journal photo by Anne Blankenship David Young, chairman of the Hamilton County Board of Supervisors, seated right, signs a document proclaiming April as Child Abuse Prevention Month in Hamilton County Tuesday morning during the board meeting. Looking on are Supervisors Dan Campadilli and Doug Bailey. Also witnessing the signing were Michelle Walters, Amy Shannon, Shelby Kroona and Lori Price.

The Hamilton County Board of Supervisors proclaimed April as Child Abuse Prevention Month during its Tuesday morning meeting at the courthouse.

Michelle Walters, director of Building Families, spoke on behalf of the Prevent Child Abuse Council of Hamilton, Humboldt and Wright Counties. brought the proclamation to the supervisors.

“We’ve gone to each board of supervisors in these counties and have asked them to adopt our proclamation to make April Child Abuse Prevention Month and to support the efforts that we’re doing in each county,” she said.

Walters told the board that instances of child abuse are “quite prevalent” in the three counties served by the council.

“Wright County is actually first in the state for child sexual abuse,” she said. “And all three counties have always been very high in numbers for child abuse in general.”

Walters said the council and the member organizations offer parenting classes, group based or individual.

“We have the HOPES program through Public Health in all three counties. And the Parent Connection program offers individualized short-term parenting help,” according to Walters.

She said there are a number of different initiatives going on for the month April.

“We’ve been providing information, education and awareness around child abuse. We have some letters to the editor that have gone out to area newspapers,” she said. On Saturday, the council will host a scavenger hunt in Humboldt.

Adam Clark of the GIS department gave a presentation on the duties of his office. Clark, the coordinator of geographic information systems, said he is able to offer a variety of support to the county offices.

“What I do here is provide mapping and data support for the county,” he said “The support that I provide to the county departments and the public both interactive maps and hard copy maps. The services provided uses GIS software and is a combination of multiple types of input.”

Clark showed those present a variety of maps and diagrams his office has completed for other county departments.

In personnel action, the supervisors recognized the hiring of Michelle Pelzer as a new park ranger for the Conservation Department. She will work at Little Wall Lake.

The supervisors set May 9 at 9 a.m. for a public hearing on the Fiscal Year 2017 budget amendment.