COUNTY WELCOMES LARGEST CLASS OF SPECIAL ADVOCATES

It is a case so terribly typical these days inside the echoing hallways of
Lucas County Juvenile Court.

There are two little boys and a crack cocaine-addicted mother.

There are allegations of neglect and violence, arrest warrants, alcohol and
drug detoxification programs, and suicide attempts. There's a Michigan
father who wants one boy, an Ohio father who wants the brother.

And here in this massive brick building in Toledo's downtown, there is an
endless stream of attorneys and caseworkers and other strangers who will
try to hammer out permanent solutions to questions of custody and care.

For the boys, there is Susan Smith.

"This is one of the more difficult cases," said Ms. Smith, one of Lucas
County's volunteer court-appointed special advocates. "The mother was
caught earlier this year driving around with them in her car while she was
drunk and high.

"It's a sad case," she said at the court yesterday. "They all are."

Today, Lucas County Juvenile Judge James Ray will swear in 33 new CASA
volunteers - the largest class ever for the county program. The volunteers
add to the ranks of 110 other men and women whose normal occupations vary
from an electrician to a business owner to a student to a retiree.

Similar CASA programs are in operation in Wood County as well as other
northwest Ohio and southeast Michigan counties. Nearly 70,000 CASA
volunteers nationwide serve about 280,000 abused or neglected children each
year. These volunteers are appointed to represent the interests of those
children in court to help assure they have a safe, permanent home to grow
up in.

"Everyone else in a courtroom has their own perspective," said Judy Leb,
CASA training coordinator. But with parents and relatives and their
attorneys all jockeying for position, she said, "someone in that courtroom
needs to have blinders on. Someone needs to be thinking purely about what
is in the best interest of that child."

CASA works like this: When Children Services workers take a child from a
home, it triggers a case in juvenile court so that a judge eventually can
determine whether the child will return home.

Given sweeping access to otherwise confidential records, over several
months a special advocate will interview everyone involved, including
teachers, parents, and friends.

They will scour reports, and they will take the child to McDonald's or to a
mall - "wherever that child will begin to trust you and open up to you,"
said Ruth Ormston, a paralegal and longtime CASA volunteer.

"I've walked in and the kids are 'Oh, here's one more person I have to talk
to,'" she said. "But they have to know 'I'm not there for your mom or the
therapist or whoever. I'm here for you.'"

Today's cases are increasingly complex, with layers of domestic violence,
mental health, and drug and alcohol issues. As a result, CASA volunteers
now are being instructed to carry only one to two cases, compared with the
handful they used to juggle, said Carol Martin, Lucas County CASA director.

That means children in fewer cases last year - only 173 of Lucas County's
456 cases, or 38 percent - were represented by a special advocate. In the
other cases, the court appointed an attorney for the child.

Today's CASA graduates have been warned about the stresses of the coming job.

"We get volunteers telling us all the time, 'I woke up at 2 a.m. and didn't
sleep again for several hours,'" Ms. Martin said. "We call it the gray
zone. The world is not black and white in this work. It's very serious.
It's about lives."

Barry Cousins, a former business owner and CASA volunteer, agreed.

"It's something that you do because you have a certain passion," he said.
"And if you can't give it your heart, you shouldn't do it at all."