Meet Ginette Williams, Executive Director of the Tree House, a nonprofit in Winder GA.
Ginette’s position allows her to help heal abused children in the community and reunite young people with their families. We’d like to thank Ginette very much for sitting down with us to discuss her experience working in Barrow County.
Enjoy our interview with Ginette
What is the Tree House?
So, we serve children and families of Barrow, Banks and Jackson County’s and basically help them heal from any type of child abuse that might have occurred in their homes.
We’ve got a couple of different programs. One is like our child forensic services where we will actually interview children when there’s an investigation going on for law enforcement.
We have supervised visitation for children who are in foster care, but the judge has concluded that they can start seeing their families. They come here for those visits and then we also provide free counseling and home parent education.
Are you married and do you have children?
I am married and I have two children that live with me full time, two teenagers.
What is your connection to Barrow County?
I actually grew up in Columbia, South Carolina and fell into this field by accident when I was doing my internship.
Right after I graduated from University of South Carolina I was looking for a child advocacy centre and that was back in 2006 and found the tree house.
And so I actually started my career here. I left in 2008 to go to Augusta and came back here in 2015 when they needed an Executive Director. They reached out to me and I was happy to come back.
What is something that’s on your bucket list?
On my bucket list? I’ve always wanted to go to Italy, that’s my thing.
Choosing someone that’s alive and not a relative, who would you like to have lunch with and why?
I would say Jodi Picoult. She is an author. Mainly because I just love her books.
They always deal with some type of ethical dilemma that people don’t really think about or realize that these things actually happen, but they do. She’s my favorite and she’s just released another book.
Where would you take her for lunch in Barrow County?
Well, of course the Bistro!
Is that your favorite restaurant in Barrow County? What do you love there?
Yes it’s my favorite restaurant here. Even though it’s a little upscale, I actually love their cheeseburger.
The Chef there has done a lot of things for our families. He has been very helpful.
What is something that stands out as unique about Barrow County compared to other places that you have lived?
So the whole appeal for me coming back here, I think was just a sense of community honestly.
Living in Augusta and working for a non-profit, there was a lot of competition and it was ugly and I knew I didn’t want to be there forever.
When they approached me about coming back here, I knew that the non-profit organizations here work so well together and are more focused on the community. They work together and focus more on the community and the families as a whole and don’t compete. We just want to help better our community and that’s why we ended up here.
Where do you see yourself or the Tree House in five to ten years?
I see us in a state of the art children’s advocacy center. I really hope that we can get the community behind us to build a space. We’re out of space. We actually have two offices. Our staff are split. We have waiting lists because we can’t hire more people.
So I really hope to see us growing with the County. And why should our county not have the best of the best when it comes to children who are abused and where they get their help.
What is something interesting that most people don’t know about you?
I go by my middle name which no one really knows. So when people hear Heather they get very confused. The reason why I go by my middle name is because it starts with a G and everybody in my family starts with a G, even the dogs!
Is there any brand that you would nominate for this project because you think they are a really good face for Barrow County?
The Vankirks. Karen and Wes Vankirk own Vankirk Electric downtown. They just bought the People’s Bank building and are re-doing a lot of the downtown area. Karen sits on my board And have just really taken in interest in the community
We hope you enjoyed learning about Ginette and her story.
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