Safety First Initiative

1. Safety First Initiative …to better serve Survivors with Disabilities

2. History and Background • Rose Brooks Center began as a hotline in 1978 and within the next year opened an emergency shelter with 19 beds. We moved into our second shelter which housed up to 50 women in 1985. • The first two shelters were housed in old homes with multiple stories. The extent of our physical accessibility was a first floor bedroom and bathroom and a ramp up to the front door. • In 2000, we were successfully able to raise $9.5 million to build a new shelter that that would house up to 75 women and children as well as combine all of our program staff under one roof. This facility is about 42,000 square feet.

3. Today: Serve over 15,000 adults and Children: • Hotline (Lethality Assessment Program) • Emergency Shelter for women, children & pets • 26 units of transitional housing • Residential and non-residential counseling, case management, chaplaincy, economic empowerment advocacy, and substance abuse services for adults and children • Community based advocacy services at 8 hospitals, 12 health clinics, 2 courts and police department • School based violence prevention program.

4. About Safety First background & context MOCSA Rose Brooks Center UMKC Institute for Human Development

5. About Safety First background & context Vision To change the mindset in the Kansas City metropolitan area resulting in a sustained collaborative response that provides culturally competent, respectful, accessible, empowerment based services to women with disabilities who are victims/survivors of violence

6. About Safety First background & context Purpose To enhance the capacity of victim service and disability support agencies to provide the protections and services needed by survivors with disabilities.  To improve the coordination of supports and services between victim service and disability service agencies that support victims with disabilities to navigate and access needed services. 

7. Needs Assessment Findings • Women with disabilities experience issues regarding believability; • Under-reporting of abuse is common; • Perception that services for women with disabilities are not always comparable to that for women in general; • Links between victim services and disability services is lacking; • Need for training and capacity building.

8. Initial Strategic Plan background & context 1. Developing policies and procedures that promote universal design and responsiveness within the collaborative partner agencies 2. Expanding safety planning processes and resources to better address the needs of survivors with disabilities 3. Building relationships and linkages between victim service providers and disability service providers.

9. Advocate Guide:Safety Planning for Persons with Disabilities • Designed for both disability and victim services providers • Built with flexibility to suit a variety of environments, situations, abilities • Safety Plan Template includes guiding questions and considerations for the advocate

10. Safety Plan Template Provides guidance on: • Getting started with safety plan • Questions to ask • Important considerations and resources • Notes section

11. Safety Plan Template • Designed to encourage discussion with survivor • Begins with broad questions to help survivor state needs • As needs identified, leads to more detailed questions • Closing section to review key aspects of plan and who is responsible for next steps

12. orientation to the A&R tool Accessibility & Responsiveness Review

13. Inclusiveness, accessibility, & responsiveness 5 domains • Inclusive practices • Inclusive communication • Inclusive environment • Inclusive policies • Building capacity orientation to the A&R tool

14. A&R Tool as a discussion guide Guiding Questions orientation to the A&R tool Notes Suggestions & Ideas

15. Scoring rubric (1)Not at all (2) Conversation stage (3) Planning stage (4) Initial implementation (5) In place orientation to the A&R tool

16. Recording your responses & action planning Indicators orientation to the A&R tool Next Steps Status (1-5) Reflections

17. Agency Specific Strategic Plans • Aligned with the 5 domains of practice, policy, communication, environment, and capacity • Each agency set own timeline and activities • Leveraged Safety First Accessibility and Responsiveness Evaluations and Strategic Plans to secure funding from other sources

18. Examples of Changes • New definition for intimate partner violence, includes personal care attendant • Budget- interpreters and accommodations • Accessibility & Responsiveness incorporated into Volunteer Training • Physical renovations • Reducing program rules & voluntary services

19. Continuation Projects • Quarterly Safety Planning trainings open to local disability service providers, domestic violence programs, and medical community • Conducted Accessibility & Responsiveness Evaluations at 4 Domestic Violence Programs and 2 Disability Service Provides • Community Forum- lessons learned and identify training needs

20. Continuation Projects • New disability service partners presenting trainings for Safety First • Set to conduct Accessibility & Responsiveness Evaluations with a SANE program at a local hospital, a community mental health agency serving immigrant and refugee community and the Municipal Court Domestic Violence unit

21. Factors in Our Success • Open to OVW process for building collaboration: • Collaboration Charter • Needs Assessment • Strategic Plan

22. Collaboration Charter

23. Identified Barriers or Challenges • Feeling vulnerable in front of your competitors • Unsure if other organizations have the ability to pull on resources in their area Shared foundational values • First, do no harm • Empowerment focused rather than protection focused. Individuals are generally best able to maintain their safety when they are in control of their services and supports. • Inclusive of survivors with disabilities • Collaboration will grow beyond initial partnership

24. Shared foundational values • We do not seek to create a new system of service. We work within and between existing service systems. • Commitment to culturally competent, respectful, accessible, empowerment based services within our own agencies. “We will represent the changes we wish to see in the community as a whole.”

25. Shared foundational values • World Health Fund definition of disability: “Disability occurs in the interaction between a person, his or her functional ability, and the environment. A person’s environment can be the physical environment, communication environment, information environment, and social and policy environment. “

26. New working definition of intimate partner violence- includes personal care attendant • Commitment within our own agency to Universal Design- welcoming environments designed for the widest range of potential users and circumstances in mind. • Individualized solutions to address individualized needs

27. Clearly defined: • Membership • Roles and responsibilities • Decision Making Process • Communication Plan • Conflict Resolution

28. Factors in Our Success • Functioned as a learning environment - openness to learning from each other and most importantly from survivors • Goal-oriented agencies sent goal-oriented individuals • All levels of the organization were represented at the collaboration table at the necessary times

29. Leveraged existing resources and relationships • Identified and implemented an effective plan for achieving our strategic planning goals (workgroups) • Approached the work with an emphasis on best practices

30. Right organizations were at the table • Right leadership in the organizations • History of collaboration • Capacity of each agency • Established trust between the agencies

31. 2006: First Technical Assistance Site Visit • Walk-through with Valeri Fletcher, identifying along the way barriers to accessibility and ways to remove these barriers and ultimately make our Center more accessible to widest range of users. • “Facility To-do List” of physical fixes • Recommendations for low cost and best solutions.

32. Universal Design = The 3 C’s • Comfort • Confidence • Control This has become the lens by which we see the world and the standard for which we have set for all our improvements.

33. If there is still time…. Applying Lessons Learned

34. The Good news is…….. Most of the improvements with the greatest impact are • Within our control to make happen • FREE.

35. In our everyday life activities, we want to have as much comfort, confidence and control in carrying out these activities. We look for ways that will make life easier. • Whether you are a survivor with a disability, someone who has been traumatized or even a new staff person in a new environment everything we can do to make it easier makes a difference.

36. Inclusive Practice: The day-to-day services needed by survivors with disabilities. It addresses not only services, but training and information for professionals in order to provide the services, and the organizational systems needed to support accessibility and responsiveness. Inclusive Policies: support a welcoming environment for the widest range of potential users and circumstances in mind.

37. Food for Thought Policy and Practice guided by: • Core Beliefs and Values • Trauma Informed Services • Philosophy on Program Rules

38. Empowerment and Right to Self Determination Survivor as expert Respect for her/his choices and control Survivor can and will take charge of her/his own life Confidentiality Believing and affirming Safety planning and promoting access to community resources

39. Empowerment and Self Determination Advocate’s values should not be projected onto survivor Role is to help critically assess chosen course of action, understand consequences of each action, and resources to advocate for her/himself

40. Safety Safety is paramount: • Do no harm • Consider risks and unintended consequences

41. Trauma Informed Services Traumatic stress involves someone experiencing overwhelming circumstances that have threatened their physical or mental well being. May be left feeling vulnerable, powerless, afraid and out of control Can negatively affect their relationships and beliefs

42. Trauma Informed Services Trauma of experiencing domestic or sexual violence compounded when a survivors has to leave her/his community, security, and physical home. Homelessness can be traumatizing experience- uncertain & anxious about the future and present. Where will I eat, sleep, bathe, use toilet in private?

43. Goal of Trauma Informed Services: Is to return to a sense of autonomy and control to the person being served. Laurie Markoff, Institute for Health and Recovery

44. Trauma Informed Services • Safety: Personal sense of physical and emotional safety • Trustworthiness: Consistency, interpersonal boundaries • Choice: Offers sense of control • Collaboration: Sharing power • Empowerment: Recognize strengths • Support the development of healthy relationships • Build healthy coping skills • Provide access to trauma-specific services • Are holistic

45. Prevents survivor from leaving house or controls when survivor returns • Controls who survivor talks to and when • Controls how survivor parents • Controls money • Disrupts or enforces bedtime, meal time, play time for family • Constant threat of being kicked out • Isolates from support system • Punished for being disrespectful, expressing anger • No privacy • Constantly creating new rules

46. Impact on Service Design • Safety • Empowerment • Healing from Trauma • Accessibility

47. Most programs have program rules • Most programs can tie these program rules directly back to safety and empowerment

48. Curfew • Set meal times • Limited access to phones • No contact with abuser • Location confidential- no visitors • Parenting- children’s bed times, no spanking, • Cleaning chores done to agency standards • Mandatory participation in services • Abusive and threatening behavior • Too many rules to remember, new rules added when a problem occurs

50. What policies or practices prevent a survivor from accessing services and safe refuge? How do program rules take away or create barriers to a survivor’s right to self determination and empowerment? What policies and practices trigger trauma response?