From the Director’s Desk, June 8, 2023

DARYL FOX: Good afternoon, everyone and welcome to the June 8, 2023 installment of From the Director’s Desk. We’re glad you’re able join us today. All audio lines are muted, as this is a listen only briefing. For reference, this recording will be posted to the OVC website tomorrow.

At this time, it’s my pleasure to--pleasure to introduce Kristina Rose, OVC Director, for today’s briefing.

KRISTINA ROSE: Thanks so much, Daryl. And good afternoon, everyone. June brings with it so many changes and opportunities for celebration, reflection, and commemoration. And this June we commemorate Hospitals Against Violence National Day of Awareness, World Elder Abuse Awareness Day, and LGBTQI Pride Month. I’m proud to say that OVC funds initiatives and resources that align with all of these calls-to-action.

For example, through our Advancing Hospital-Based Victim Services program, we fund victim service providers in hospital emergency rooms to connect victims of violence in under-resourced communities with the services and support needed to aid in their healing.

And through our elder justice-focused programs, like the National Center for Elder Justice Coalitions and the Elder Fraud Hotline, we’re ensuring that older victims of crime have access to trauma-informed services and resources that protect their safety and confidentiality.

And through our trainings, like Serving LGBTQ Survivors of Violence, we’re increasing access to victim services by building providers’ capacity to serve victims of crime, who are experiencing gender-based violence or bias.

Learn more about each of these commemorations and the work that we’re doing in all of these areas on the Featured Resources section of our website at ovc.ojp.gov/news.

And last month, U.S. Attorney Lane Tucker from Alaska joined me and Tribal Division Director LeBretia White, Chief of Staff Sasha Rutizer, and Grant Program Specialists Ivette Estrada and Bonnie Robertson on a site visit to Bethel, AK. And while we were there, we met with the Tundra Women’s Coalition, where we in addition to staff from the International Association of Forensic Nurses received a briefing on their work with survivors of sexual assault, domestic violence, and child abuse. We met with and learned about their strong multidisciplinary team that includes advocates, state and local police, forensic nurse examiners, and prosecutors.

To fully appreciate the access challenges facing the team in Bethel, it's important to note that they serve 56 villages in an area that is the size of Oregon. And airplanes, for the most part, are the only mode of transportation to go in or out of Bethel; though sometimes you can use boats or snowmobiles. But even in the face of these challenges, the Tundra Women's Coalition serves approximately 325 people per year and about 10,000 shelter nights. Their child advocacy center served 250 children last year. We were able to tour their new hospital, the Yukon-Kuskokwim Health Corporation Tribal Organization, and they serve over 50 rural communities in southwest Alaska and it is a beautiful facility. Special thank you to Sarah Sears, a forensic nurse, who's also the assistant medical director for their SART there.

We had hoped to fly to Hooper Bay, Alaska for the opening of their new child advocacy center and tour their domestic violence shelter, but the trip was cancelled due to bad weather. And this happened to us last September also. It really drove home for us the reality of how difficult it can be to provide services in the most isolated areas of Alaska.

I do want to thank Eileen Arnold and the staff of the Tundra Women 's Coalition, the folks at rural caps, the folks at the Denali Commission for making us feel so welcome and for what they do every day to bring hope and healing to the tundra region.

I also had the pleasure of presenting on OVC priorities with some of my favorite federal colleagues on a panel during National Advocacy Day for the National Alliance to End Sexual Violence and the National Network to End Domestic Violence. I truly enjoyed the opportunity to speak to the coalitions, to see many old friends and colleagues, and even connect with some new ones.

And now, I want to give you the monthly update for the Crime Victims Fund. The amount collected for the month of April was $225.1 million dollars, bringing total FY ‘23 receipts to $1 billion dollars. As of April 30, the CVF balance now sits at $2.388 billion dollars. However, this doesn’t take into consideration the programs we still have left to fund this year, and that amounts to about $1.74 billion. This means the “actual” balance of the fund now sits at about $648 million. The CVF is averaging roughly $150 million dollars per month in receipts. And if this trend continues, we can estimate that the balance of the CVF at the start of ‘24 will probably be about $1.4 billion. But I say this with caution, because we really do not have a way to predict what the monthly deposits will be.

I am pleased to share though that we’ve posted additional charts to the OVC website to provide even more transparency around the CVF. You’ll find charts about the victim assistance formula allocations, subawards, and victims served; as well as cumulative monthly deposit charts in an easier-to-read format. You’ll see that in FY ‘22, VOCA subgrantees served 9.8 million victims, including new and returning individuals. My hat is off to them.

I also want to provide an update about our efforts to strengthen the crime victim compensation guidelines. I’ve mentioned the work we’ve been doing in this area on and off for about the last year. But earlier this week, through a directors message that we emailed, I provided the status to date. And I want to share a little bit of that here.

Over the last year, we’ve been working with our partners to gather information on how we can increase access and equity to victim compensation through some changes in the guidelines. We've had 10 listening sessions, numerous community engagements. We’ve heard from survivors, direct service providers, state administrators, national advocacy organizations, and federal and tribal leaders.

Among the useful feedback that we’ve received, some issues stood out, including, but not limited to the following:

• Expanding allowable medical, mental health, and culturally appropriate services to allow more flexibility for care.
• Expanding access to the compensation programs themselves and increasing outreach about the availability of compensation.
• Addressing the complexity of applying for funding and the delays that victims may experience in receiving it.
• And addressing the challenges in demonstrating cooperation with reasonable requests from law enforcement and the adverse impact of a determination regarding a victim’s possible contributory conduct.

As our next step, OVC will publish our recommended updates to the crime victim compensation program guidelines as what we call a proposed rule in the Federal Register through a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking. Once the Notice is published, there’ll be an open comment period to gather additional input. Our goal is to have this done by the end of 2024.

I want to commend the many states across the country that have already made changes to their own state laws to increase access and equity to compensation. We are learning from you. And in the meantime, we’ve taken additional steps to increase access to compensation for victims of crime who have been historically underserved and adversely affected by inequality; steps that were influenced by state administrators who’ve shared the changes they have made. For example, our OVC VOCA Center is offering new resources and workshops for administrators on victim-centered correspondence, the expansion of exceptions to requiring cooperation with reasonable requests from law enforcement, and best practices for compensation claim processing. We also funded the first National Center for Culturally Responsive Victim Services. You’ve probably known about that for a while, but we have been asking them for assistance with addressing systemic barriers to compensation for victims of crime in communities of color.

And now, I have a few housekeeping items!

• First, is that the 2024 National Crime Victims’ Rights Week nomination period will be opening in mid-July. You may recall that we did not host an Awards Ceremony this year, so we could think about the ways in which to improve and streamline the process. This year, you’ll see some changes, including new nomination categories. Stay tuned and start thinking about the outstanding organizations and individuals that you want to nominate!

• Also, we've extended the solicitation timeline for a couple of solicitations that are out right now. One is the FY ‘23 Jabara-Heyer NO HATE--NO HATE Act State-Run Hate Crime Reporting Hotlines solicitation. And the other is the Action Partnerships solicitation. So if you are interested in applying for those, it's not too late and you can go to the “Current Funding Opportunities” section of the OVC website.

• As we approach the 2nd anniversary of my appointment as OVC Director, I’ve been taking stock of OVC’s accomplishments and the lessons that we’ve learned over the last 2 years. And I’d like to share my insights from, really, an informal analysis that I had done, during next month’s From the Director’s Desk Briefing. So I just want to warn you in advance, it might be a bit longer than our typical briefing, but I still hope that you will join me for that.

• And on a final note, I do want to make everyone aware of reports we've received that OVC is being used in government imposter scams. This is very, very troubling to me! The scammers are trying to convince people to send them money and they're using OVC 's name, usually in the header of a letter or an email, because it makes it sound more serious and legitimate. They're signing communications in my name. And they're using OVC’s prior and current logos. Please know that OVC will never contact an individual to demand money, or to let you know that you're eligible for compensation or restitution related to a specific case. If you ever receive a communication from us and money is being requested or you're being asked to open a bank account, do not hesitate to contact us to inquire about its legitimacy! Please don’t use the phone numbers they provide, because it’s likely associated with the scam. You can find our contact information at ovc.ojp.gov. And you always report suspected scams to the Federal Trade Commission, either online or at 877-FTC-help, HEWP. I mean HELP. [Laughter] Oh my goodness.

With that, thank you so much for joining me again this month. Enjoy the rest of your week and do take care. And once again, thank you for everything you’re doing to help victims find their justice.