From the Director’s Desk, August 10, 2023

DARYL FOX: Good afternoon everyone and welcome to the August 10, 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 tomorrow to the OVC website.

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

KRISTINA ROSE: Thanks, Daryl. And good afternoon, everyone.

Summer is always such a busy season for us at OVC, as we review and process grant applications. But this year’s been paired with a very busy conferencing season as well.

In July, I traveled to Atlanta, Georgia for the 37th Annual National Parents of Murdered Children Conference, and I received such a warm welcome from those attendees. This is one of my favorite conferences to attend, because I’m able to witness such strong peer support and compassion each time I’m there among all of the attendees.

And they showed quite a bit of interest in the outreach we are planning to do with funeral home directors. And in fact, several of the attendees approached me afterwards to tell me that they worked at funeral homes, and offered their thoughts on how we could best accomplish our goal. That was a wonderful surprise, and I so appreciated those conversations. 

Oh, and I was also able to cuddle up—I mean—visit with a couple of the therapy dogs that I met at last year’s conference. Their presence is so comforting and welcome and it’s always a true highlight for me.

After leaving Georgia, I traveled to New Orleans for the National Organization for Victim Assistance’s 49th annual training event. And, like Georgia, it was … hot. But it was also another truly welcoming atmosphere.

NOVA put together an amazing agenda, and I was able to provide an update on our progress to revise the crime victims’ compensation guidelines, among many other updates.

But I also got to attend some panels, and I attended a very candid panel that was a discussion among five men who talked about male victims and survivors of sexual assault in the military. And I honestly don’t think a panel like that would have or could have happened even a decade ago.

I also attended a panel featuring the Network for Victim Recovery of DC, and they were discussing their experience with placing a crime victims’ rights attorney in a hospital emergency room. And it was just fascinating. And I’m looking forward to learning more about that.

It was really great to connect with so many OVC grantees at the NOVA conference. Actually, it was so good I extended my visit just to spend a little more time there. It was really just wonderful to make those connections. I spent a lot of time in the exhibit hall, and so many of the folks there were, in one way or another, affiliated with or working on an OVC grant. So that was pretty cool.

Next week, I’ll be traveling with a large contingent from OVC to our National Joint Training Conference for VOCA Victim Assistance and Victim Compensation Administrators. And that’s in Chicago.

And I’m looking forward to this event because it was truly designed and informed by the people that are going to be attending—the VOCA administrators. They told us what they wanted to hear about, and we worked with the conference host, which is the National Association of VOCA Assistance Administrators, to make sure that that happened.

OVC staff will be presenting on a variety of workshops, including workshops on compensation certification forms, meeting the needs of survivors with disabilities, improving outcomes for youth and minor victims of human trafficking, and addressing housing needs for victims of crime.

And I’ll be sure to highlights some really interesting things that I learned there from the conference at the September briefing.

As I mentioned at the top, we have been busy processing solicitations and one milestone I wanted to highlight for you all is the number of awards that we’re making in FY ‘23 under what we call the Tribal Victim Service Set-Aside program. And you’ll hear me refer to it as the TVSSA.

I want to provide just a little bit of background… I’ve talked about the program before, but I do think it’s worth repeating for those who are not familiar with it.

In FY ‘18—and “FY” stands for “fiscal year”—Congress authorized a percentage of the Crime Victims Fund allocation to support a set-aside program for Tribes to provide services for crime victims in Tribal communities. And the funding can be used to support a number of activities including—

• direct services,
• needs assessment,
• strategic planning,
• program development and implementation,
• expansion of programs that already exist,
• community outreach,
• education, and
• support for Missing and Murdered Indigenous Persons.

And there is more as well.

But since 2018, we've been able to make a number of changes to the program, all in response to what the Tribes have communicated to us. And those changes include—

• Establishing a Tribal Division within OVC that is dedicated to the TVSSA program, and other Tribal grant programs.
• We implemented a formula for disbursing Tribal Set-Aside funds so that Tribes would not have to compete against each other for those precious funds.
• We offer tribal applicants the flexibility to choose an award period between 12–60 months. We also offer choices for documenting their project design plans.
• We use a two-stage formula allocation to divide unclaimed TVSSA funds among the participating Tribes. And that was something that they made clear to us that they wanted.
• We were also able to clarify the allowability of certain expenses related to culturally specific services, and how construction costs might be supported.
• We were also able to expand the uses of TVSSA funds to support victim services in Missing and Murdered Indigenous Person cases.

So because of these changes, and because of the incredible work that the Tribes are doing, I am pleased to announce that we’re making more awards under this program than we've ever made before—212 of them—which is a 20 percent increase over FY ‘22.

So we are really proud of that. And the OVW consultation is going on in Oklahoma right now, and we have several of our leadership staff there listening to the testimony that they’re making. And they may come back with even more recommendations for improving how we respond to our tribal communities.   

Next, the Crime Victims Fund update. The amount of money that was deposited into the Crime Victims Fund, or the CVF, in the month of June was $7.3 million. It wasn’t spectacular. As of June 30, the CVF balance was $2.36 billion. And as you all know, this doesn’t take into consideration the programs that we still have left to fund in fiscal year ‘23. So when you remove those commitments, the balance of the Fund is about $680 million.

And as I repeat every month, the deposits are hard to predict, but we are estimating that the balance of the Fund at the start of FY ‘24 will be approximately $1.3 billion. So, we should have plenty of money to meet the $1.2 billion dollar cap that was put forward in the President’s budget as well as the House and Senate marks.

As always, we will keep you updated on the status of the CVF.

And now for some exciting news. I have some details about National Crime Victims’ Rights Week in 2024! We will be observing NCVRW the week of April 21–27, the last full week in April.

And I’m very excited to announce that we have decided on a 2024 theme, and you all are going to be the first to hear it. 

This year we decided to create a theme where we actually pose a question. So here it is:

How would you help?

Options, services, and hope for crime survivors.

This year’s theme recognizes that we—and I’m talking about the universal we—all have a role in supporting crime survivors. Most victims of crime do not report the crime to the police. And many never tell anyone at all. When someone chooses not to talk about a crime that happened to them, it’s even less likely they will ever find out about the services that are available that can help them. And when trauma goes unaddressed, it can cause deep emotional and physical damage that lasts a lifetime.

So, this theme begs the question: Are you prepared to offer support if a friend, a colleague, a neighbor, a family member confides in you about a crime they experienced? 

And the theme encourages everyone to learn more about the resources available in their community, their state, and across the country that provide the emotional, the financial, the spiritual, and the medical assistance to those who have been harmed by crime.

I hope that this theme resonates with you, and that you’ll help us raise awareness about the importance of being informed in a way that offers hope to survivors that they have a safe place to share as much or as little of what happened to them as they want.

In other NCVRW news, the nomination period closes tonight at 11:59 p.m., so be sure to wrap up your nomination packages and get it submitted. And that’s 11:59 p.m. eastern time. As a reminder, the categories are:

• National Crime Victim Service Award,
• Allied Professional Award,
• Survivor Voices Award,
• Building Knowledge Through Research Award, and
• Tomorrow’s Leader Award.

Now I know that some people may have experienced an error submitting their nominations earlier today. We do think that we have fixed the problem, but if you experience any difficulty reach out. Information about how to contact us is on our website. Give us a call, send us an email. We will absolutely consider opening the nomination period up a little bit longer if we need to.

So, check out our website for descriptions of each of the categories and nominate that extraordinary person that lifts up survivor voices in everything that they do. We are really excited about reading what you submit!

And then, very last, I just want to give a quick shout-out to the folks at Roca in Baltimore. Roca is a community-based violence intervention and prevention organization that I had the pleasure of visiting yesterday. JT, Kurt, Jamal, Tyrone, Anisha, Andrea, and Cal – thank you so much for your time and your hospitality. You are doing such critical, life-saving work, and for that, we are so grateful.

So thank you for joining me again this month. Enjoy the rest of your week and take good care. Thank you for everything that you do to help crime victims find their justice.