‘More than just companions’: Child advocacy centre gets new support dog

Realtors, Royal Lepage have donated a new support dog to the centre to help children suffering abuse. The centre now has 3 dogs – Rue, Quinn and Carter.

The Central Alberta Child Advocacy Centre (CACAC) in Red Deer welcomed a new support dog to help children through difficult times.

Rue is the four-pawed friend donated to the CACAC by Royal LePage Realty Corp. She comes from Dogs With Wings Facility and has spent the past month in Edmonton training with a handler.

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The centre now has three service dogs: Rue, Quinn and Carter.

“They’re more than just companions,” said Cassandra Galenzoski, director of operations for CACAC.

The dogs are trained to support kids going through hard times. Galenzoski said they sit in with them during the interview process to try to “bring down the stress levels.”

The dogs can even take the stand with children in court to ease the nerves of testifying.

Galenzoski said the centre is seeing over 500 children and youth per year that need support, so the demand is keeping service dogs like Rue “booked and busy.”

“They are considered employees, right? So they have working hours, they get vacation. They work really hard when they’re here,” Galenzoski said.

But the dogs still “get to be dogs,” she said, when their service vest is off.

Galenzoski said Rue still has a “transition period” before she can do full-time service.

The CACAC is a non-profit group started in 2017 by CEO Mark Jones. Jones banded a team of community members and organizations that wanted to protect children and support their families.

Now, much of their work addresses the multi-faceted problems of neglect, abuse, maltreatment and mental health issues and the ensuing legal processes.

“Part of our role is to not cause additional trauma, because something already happened to those kids when they got here,” Galenzoski said. “So we’re trying to make the process as streamlined and seamless as possible.”

Because there are costs associated with the three service dogs, the CACAC has a program on their website that people are able to support.

Galenzoski said there are also plenty of volunteer options – there’s even a chance to volunteer to raise the next dog like Rue.