New York City Alliance Against Sexual Assault

Programs: Intervention & best care program:a) nycaasa currently organizes one of the largest training programs for licensed medical personnel in new york state called the sexual assault forensic examiner training institute ("safeti"). It provides a 40-hour basic course certified by the nys department of health and continuing medical education classes. Training is also provided to human services professionals. This year, the nycaasa began offering online courses that provide continuing education units (ceus) to social workers. As one of the largest nys doh-approved training programs, safeti ensures that medical professionals are trained in victim-centered approaches to acute intervention and collection of forensic evidence in the sexual assault context. Our goal is to ensure that victims of sexual assault are provided with competent, compassionate and prompt care, while providing the most advanced technology associated with dna and other sexual assault forensic evidence collection and preservation. In fy 2017, we trained 1144 medical and human services professionals in best care after a sexual assault. B) direct services program: in 2014, the nycaasa was awarded a grant to provide services to survivors of sexual assault who are experiencing difficulties accessing services from health care and criminal justice institutions. Via the program alliance for advocacy, nycaasa provides direct service to victims of sexual violence who are experiencing difficulty accessing help from systems meant to assist. This program serves as a referral hub for rape crisis centers and provides supportive services along with advocacy with law enforcement, criminal justice and health institutions. In fy2017, we provided crisis counseling as well as criminal justice and personal advocacy to 257 survivors of sexual violence.

sexual assault prevention program:nycaasa is a regional center for the primary prevention of sexual violence in new york city by the nys department of health. As the lead organization, nycaasa collaborates with 4 rape crisis program subcontractors to provide prevention programming in nyc. This program has three major components: 1) working to create safe nightlife spaces by training bar staff and patrons on how to recognize signs of potential sexual assaults 2) facilitating a year-long, anti-violence curriculum in a south bronx middle school and 3) providing workshops for teens in diverse communities on healthy relationships, consent and bystander intervention and creating messaging for city-wide social messaging campaigns. Through the nycaasa campus training institute, nycaasa helps campuses improve their response to sexual violence in two ways. The first method provides technical assistance to rape crisis centers in new york state on providing intervention and prevention programming to their campus partners. In fy 2017, nycaasa worked with 28 rape crisis and sexual violence prevention programs on individual training and technical assistance in the nyc downstate, lower hudson and long island regions. In fy2017, nycaasa provided technical assistance webinars and trainings to 290 individuals in these regions. Secondly, nycaasa directly aids colleges and universities in new york city to strengthen prevention efforts and improve responses to sexual violence. In fy2017, working regularly with 8 core nyc campuses, nycaasa delivered 97 workshops and 6 panel events reaching over 3,600 students, staff, administrators, and faculty. We also launched a campus corner in our newsletter and are building a student advisory board to guide our work. Nycaasa provides education and technical assistance services to all five boroughs of new york city, works closely with rape crisis centers programs statewide, hospitals, district attorneys offices, the new york city police department, court officials, city leaders and others to develop and implement best practices and policies in the treatment of sexual assault survivors. The nycaasa bi-weekly e-newsletter is distributed to over 7,500 people on timely up-dates in the field. Nycaasa has conducted significant research on topics such as: sexual assault in high schools (partners and peers), sexual assault in the immigrant community (bringing the global to the local) and an evaluation of services from a survivor point of view (a room of our own). Nycaasa is currently working on a follow-up study to bringing the global to the local on patterns of help-seeking activities of immigrant women affected by sexual assault and the obstacles commonly they commonly face. This project, action research for immigrant social empowerment or arise, is a coalition of immigrant-serving organizations working to address intimate partner sexual violence.

public policy program:nycaasa provides leadership on the issue of sexual assault in new york city. We convene the rape crisis centers annually to discuss priority needs of sexual assault survivors. Additionally, through our research, direct programming work and citywide task force participation, we identify the primary, underlying issues facing survivors of sexual assault. We communicate these priorities to media outlets, public officials and stakeholders in the field in an effort to improve the response to sexual assault survivors city-wide. Nycaasa was a crucial partner in the passage of legislation that required new york state's private and public colleges to address the issue of sexual assault. This legislation, passed in 2015, was implemented in 2016-17 state wide. Nycaasa assisted that implementation by: providing technical assistance to rape crisis centers on campus sexual assault issues, holding conferences and trainings on the law and best evidence interventions in campus sexual assault. The alliance worked with the nys police on responding sensitively and through to sexual assault complaints by holding a survivor panel for the staff of their new sexual assault division. Results from a survey conducted in december 2016 showed that over 600 trainings were held state-wide by rape crisis centers in the campus setting in six months in 2016 reaching over 30,000 students. Funding for rape crisis services in new york state reached an all-time low in 2014. The lack of fund resulted in waiting lists for services state-wide and layoffs in staff. Nycaasa led an effort to increase the funding provided by the state government. January 2017, was the first year that $10,988,000 for rape crisis programs was included in governor cuomo's executive budget and then passed by assembly and senate. Of this total, 6,488,000 was dedicated to services and prevention of sexual assault and $4,500,000 was dedicated to campus sexual assault. The previous amount dedicated to services state-wide was 1,880,000. Nycaasa worked on various state and city legislative efforts to reduce the obstacles experienced by sexual assault victims who seek care from hospitals or rape crisis centers as well as those who seek redress through the criminal justice system. In that effort, nycaasa has participated in efforts to:extend the statute of limitations in child sexual abuse cases, train the nys parole board on sexual assault issues, improve the nys office of victim service's compensation for crime victims system, promote early anti-violence education in nys public schools, improve the treatment of rape in jails and prisons and create a pilot program that would provide emergency shelter to victims of sexual abuse in new york city. Finally, the executive director of nycaasa, mary haviland, was selected to serve on the new york police department timony review committee which was created to review randomly selected closed sexual assault cases. The committee discusses these cases with leadership in the police departments special victims division as well as the collaborative policing division. Periods of three-day reviews are held twice a year.