 A group of about five women in Niswa have started a new program to help put an end to local sex trafficking. They're known as the Truth Group and they held their first official meeting on Tuesday. A group of women is hoping to raise awareness about the issue to keep children safe. Now during the meeting local law enforcement spoke to parents about how to keep kids safe online and through social media as well. I'm glad to see the community getting involved because that's really what that's really where it starts you know us as law enforcement we get kind of spread through some times and we have a lot of different avenues and we need to go down on a day-to-day basis but the community is really important to get involved and that's really where it starts is prevention education and what what we can do as a community as a whole. Other local resources shared personal stories when dealing with victims of sex trafficking. The professionals say that victims often were not aware what was happening to them when they first met their perpetrator. With a level of knowledge and education the community is hoping to prevent sex trafficking just by raising awareness. We have really started something here and we hope we can just continue on to just keep letting people know you know we have to stick together we have to watch out for each other and if we see something that's not quite right you know we want to report it. The Truth Group will continue their efforts in the community by planning future events to keep the community united against sex trafficking. If you enjoyed this segment of Lakeland news please consider making a tax-deductible contribution to Lakeland PBS.