BECKLEY, WV (WOAY) – Dr. Kristi Dumas has been officially sworn in as executive director of CASA of New River.
This allows her to be a voice for abused and neglected children in court, advocating their placement in a safe and loving home.
“During COVID, I was serving on the West Virginia State CASA board of directors and really advocated to have CASA in Raleigh county understanding all of the challenges that we have,” Dumas said “And, seeing the flood of children in the foster care system I knew that we needed a voice for the child.”
The executive director says she’s passionate about the position. She has worked in the court system doing psychological evaluations and knows there’s such a need for children to have someone advocating for them.
“And who’s really advocating for permanency for them? It’s very easy to get in the system, and sometimes it’s really hard to get out,” said Dumas. “So we want to be the eyes and the ears for the judge and the voice for the child.”
According to the executive director, the first step is CASA establishing themselves and educating everyone on who they are, then galvanizing the community around volunteerism.
“There are so many ways to give back with CASA. Whether it’s your time, your talent or your treasure — we welcome it all,” Dumas said. “So we will be looking to the community to get involved with CASA and really make this a movement that all of us can participate in.”
She says this is all hands on deck to collaborate with CASA and be part of something transformative.
“We want people to know that this is their program, this is the people’s program,” said the executive director. “And this is a way for us to really change things around and be the beacon of light that Raleigh County ought to be in the state.”
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“All of our updates, our events, the things that we’re doing — all of those things will be on there,” Dumas said. “Our calls for volunteerism and our calls for donation will be there.”
