Now Available: 'Privacy, Confidentiality and Privileged Communications' Booklet

Privacy, confidentiality and privileged communications are the keystones to safety for survivors. Protecting the privacy and confidentiality of victims of domestic violence is directly related to a survivor’s ability to trust, ask for advocacy, support, and help. Explore NIWRC’s updated booklet, “Privacy, Confidentiality and Privileged Communications: Keystones to Safety,” which provides guidance for advocates and shelter programs to understand and implement or integrate these practices for the protection of those who experience violence policy, law and funding conditions, but also in terms of its impact on the safety and integrity of Native communities. Download the booklet here.

Register: ‘Providing Safety for Domestic Violence Survivors During the Time of a Pandemic’ on July 8th

The hardships imposed by COVID-19 are numerous, impacting advocates as individuals and their ability to provide advocacy, resources and shelter to domestic violence survivors. Stay-At-Home orders, social distancing and the other necessary steps intended to offer protection from COVID-19, often escalate the danger to victims of domestic violence and create barriers to safety. This webinar explores strategies advocates have created to navigate the challenges of the pandemic, including issues of self-care, shortages of personal protective equipment, outreach, crisis response, shelter and law enforcement and justice systems responses. With no end date in sight for the pandemic, long-term strategies are key to this discussion. Hope and resilience grow stronger when we come together. Hope you will join us! Register for the July webinar here. Did you miss our June webinar? Watch the recording here.

Listen to our New Podcast: Speaking Our Truth, Podcast For Change

Safety and justice require action. As a movement, we can use our collective voices to engage and influence change. NIWRC’s new resource, Speaking Our Truth, Podcast For Change, is aimed at building joint action. In our first podcast series, hear interviews from staff at the National Indigenous Women’s Resource Center including Rose Quilt and Liz Carr, as well as Errica “CC” Hovie from the StrongHearts Native Helpline, NIWRC counsel Mary Kathryn Nagle who updates on our VAWA Sovereignty Initiative, and our Native Hawaiian sisters at Pouhana O Na Wahine. Listen now on our website. You can also pull up the podcast on your home devices by saying, "Play the latest episode of Speaking Our Truth Podcast for Change on Spotify, Stitcher, Tune In, or Apple Music." 

Youth Opportunity: World Without Exploitation Youth Summit

How do we create a more equitable and exploitation-free world? We do it by coming together, which is what Equal Not Exploited - the third annual World Without Exploitation (WorldWE) Youth Summit - is all about. This year, WorldWE is taking its annual gathering of allies, activists and artists, ages 16 - 28, into a digital space, reaching a national audience. During our education and activism-focused summit you’ll hear from those impacted by exploitation … learn more about its root causes and consequences … and explore new and creative strategies for creating a world where no one is bought, sold or exploited. There are two youth sessions: July 15 and July 22 from 4:30-6:30 p.m. ET. There is no cost to participate. Learn more and register here.

Conference Update: 2020 National Conference on Safe Housing Goes Virtual

In the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent restrictions, the planning team for the 2020 National Conference on Safe Housing: “Addressing the Housing Needs of Survivors of Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault” is pleased to announce that we’re going virtual and is now scheduled for October 20-22, 2020. In light of the way current events have evolved, we are committed to addressing topics that are relevant to the issues we’re all facing on a daily basis. A series of plenary sessions breakout sessions and interactive small group sessions will be conducted in a virtual space that allows us to explore best practices, evidence-based approaches, and innovative safe housing solutions. Visit the conference website for updates as they become available.

What We're Reading

• Chris Stark: Confronting Terror in North Minneapolis
• Pride Month: 'Back to Indigenous Values'
• Detroit: Budget cuts and coronavirus force vital American Indian Services resource center to close after 49 years
• Wisconsin family calls for harsher charges in 'heinous' killing of Ho-Chunk woman
• Human Rights Campaign: Report shows LGBTQ people more likely to be victims of interpersonal violence
• Albuquerque hospital's secret policy separated Native American newborns from their mothers

Funding Notices

• U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families: 
  • Demonstration Grants to Strengthen the Response to Victims of Human Trafficking in Native Communities (VHT-NC) Program (Due 7/6)