Specialized Services for Human Trafficking Victims in Hennepin County, Minnesota

The goal of the FY 2020 Services for Victims of Human Trafficking Programs is to enhance the quality and quantity of services available to victims of human trafficking, as defined by the Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA) of 2000, as amended. Funding through this program supports direct services to victims of sex trafficking and labor trafficking, as well as for efforts to increase the capacity of communities to respond to human trafficking through the development of interagency partnerships, professional training, and public awareness activities over a three-year project period.

The International Institute of Minnesota (IIM) will provide supportive services to victims of sex and labor trafficking in Hennepin County, including the City of Minneapolis. Hennepin County, the most populous county in the state, is home to Minnesota's third largest concentration of foreign-born residents (14.1 percent), which includes people from Africa, Asia, and Latin America. While IIM's Anti-Trafficking program provides case management support for foreign born trafficking survivors across Minnesota, the highest concentration of clients resides in Hennepin County; 25 of 47 clients in 2018 and 22 of 52 clients in 2019 (53.2 percent and 42.3 percent of all assisted victim-survivors, respectively) lived in Hennepin County. OVC funding will increase the capacity of IIM's Anti-Trafficking program to serve 30 victims of sex and/or labor trafficking in Hennepin County annually over the next 36 months. CA/NCF.