 What makes for excellence in heart care? It starts with one of the most amazing teams of heart surgeons and cardiologists that I've seen assembled under one roof and the region's leading technology in a new $40 million facility. This is the nationally recognized Heart and Vascular Institute of Eastern Kentucky at Pikeville Medical Center. On Thursday, March 23rd, Pike County Judge Executive Ray Jones signed another proclamation regarding child abuse. This proclamation recognizes the month of April 2023 as Child Abuse Prevention Month. Jones expresses his thoughts toward the long-standing issue and thanks to community members involved. It has been a problem across our nation for decades. Every year, thousands of kids are seriously injured or killed by child abuse and countless others are scarred for life. There's no place for child abuse in our society and I want to thank our social workers, our police officers and our prosecutors for taking the steps to protect our kids and to put perpetrators behind bars where they need to be. Throughout the next month, there will be several events such as Gatties Goes Blue on March 31st and Kids Day in the Park on April 15th. These events are just one way to highlight the importance of protecting our children. This is an issue that we can't go enough attention to and it's great that we have a proclamation that's declared in April as the Child Abuse Prevention Month. It's one of the most serious things that we deal with in prosecuting. We work with the social workers and until we have great social workers that are really dedicated to what they do, you won't find employees that are more dedicated to the job they do to protect these children. These are most vulnerable victims that we can have in our justice system. So it needs special attention and I think that things like this, what we're doing today is just bringing attention to that and will help us in that endeavor. Any time we can protect our children or elderly, as you say, then it is a service to community and something we take very seriously in my office as well as I know everybody else involved in it. We work closely with Judy's place. They do a great job in the forensic interviews, which are very important in prosecuting the case. Reporting from Mountain Top News, I'm Nick Collum.