Gingerbread House Children's Advocacy Center

The Gingerbread House is a community-based, 501(c)(3) non-profit organization that works collaboratively with law enforcement, child protective services, the district attorneys' offices, and medical and mental health professionals to investigate, prosecute, and treat cases of child sexual abuse and severe physical abuse. The comprehensive Child Advocacy Program at the Gingerbread House includes 7 core components: forensic interviews, multidisciplinary investigations, child life, family advocacy, counseling, prevention education and professional training.

▪ The Gingerbread House is an Accredited Member of the National Children's Alliance (national organization for child advocacy centers).
▪ The Gingerbread House handles the highest forensic interview case load out of the 15 child advocacy centers in the state of Louisiana.
▪  All services are provided free of charge to victims and their families.

To give you an even better idea of the impact we are able to make in our community as a result of donor support like yours, we’d like to share with you our most recently completed annual outcomes for Year 2022. Between January 1, 2023 and December 31, 2023 at the Gingerbread House…

▪ 910 children received forensic interviews, multidisciplinary investigations, child life and family advocacy services, averaging 76 forensic interviews per month.
▪ 204 child victims and their non-offending caregivers received trauma-informed counseling services.
▪ 119 child sex trafficking victims (14 confirmed victims and 105 suspected victims) received comprehensive direct care services and case management.
▪ As part of our prevention efforts, over 57,017 children and adults participated in 676 educational outreach sessions.

Thanks to the generosity of donors like you, all services were offered free of charge to victims so that no child is ever turned away due to a family’s inability to pay for services.

Testimonials

"I have been a passionate supporter of the Gingerbread House for over 15 years. As a person who is involved with many nonprofit organizations across our community... the Gingerbread House is the one that you can't argue with me about! As a Children's Advocacy Center, the staff at the Gingerbread House deal with one of the most difficult issues facing our society... childhood abuse, both sexual and physical. The Gingerbread House provides education, acceptance, love, and most importantly... HOPE for the children who are suffering most. Child abuse does not discriminate... it affects children from all walks of life....all races and socio economic situations. It affects children that we all know. Over the course of the past 25 years, the GBH has saved the tax payers of Caddo Parish more than 15.1 million dollars... and while that's an amazing feat... it doesn't compare to the work that happens there every single day. There is no price tag for that work..... for it is priceless."
Waynette Ballengee
Gingerbread House Board President

"Before Gingerbread House was formed in 1998, abused children would often be subjected to multiple interviews, often 5-8 interviews, by law enforcement, child protective services, and others. These interviews would take place at the police or sheriff's stations, typically in very sterile and plain environments that were not child-friendly in the least. As a result, less than 5% of cases were being successfully prosecuted. We knew there had to be a better way, so we looked at national models and best practices, and moved forward with establishing the Gingerbread House Children's Advocacy Center. For the past 25 years that we've had the Gingerbread House, children are now interviewed once by trained forensic interviewers employed by the Gingerbread House, in child-friendly rooms. Law enforcement and child protective services monitor the interviews in an adjacent room. We have expanded our outreach from Caddo and Bossier parishes, to all of northwest Louisiana, including Webster, DeSoto, Bienville, Claiborne, Natchitoches, Red River and Sabine parishes. We have also added free counseling services to the victims and their families, as well as a comprehensive prevention education program for children and adults in the community. Currently, over 96% of cases accepted for prosecution are successfully prosecuted. What was once a dream…helping children who had been hurt…has indeed become a reality through the Gingerbread House."
David L. White
Attorney at Law
Gingerbread House Founding Member