These are COMBAT-funded programs with a domestic violence emphasis or component.

Bilingual Hotline Response, Crisis Support & Victim Advocacy

NEWHOUSE PROGRAM -- Hotlines serve as an essential resource for victims and bystanders of violence. Nearly 99% of all crisis hotline callers accessed at least one emergency support service, including counseling, sheltering and victim advocacy. Newhouse is an 88-bed emergency shelter facility offering safe housing and critical supportive services to domestic violence victims and their children. Within the heart of the shelter is the Hotline room, staff by trained and experienced Hotline Advocates, who responded to over 12,000 calls in 2020. The Hotline serves as a critical means to access services and began the journey from victim to survivor free from violence. The COMBAT Mid-Year grant will provide vital funding to support client-centered, trauma-informed and culturally-sensitive emergency services for domestic violence victims in the community.
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Blue Springs COPS Program

BLUE SPRINGS POLICE DEPARTMENT PROGRAM -- The Community Outreach Prevention Strategies (COPS) program addresses children and families’ mental health needs, as well as crime and violence prevention and substance abuse prevention, with the focus on youth, family and the community. Counselors conduct assessments on all individuals to identify their needs, formulate a plan that is appropriate for the situation that COPS offer, including counseling, case management, mentoring and consulting. Counselors will meet with individuals at their location, schools, outreach locations or office. Officers and counselors lead decision making classes consisting of supportive parenting, racial-bias, healthy relationships, impulse control, personal safety, legal awareness, and drug and alcohol groups. Participants may be appropriately assigned a community services day, Girls on Fire program or the Life Sports program, which is conducted by Blue Springs Police Department’s officers and counselors.
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BIP & Peaceful Path Diversion Program

SYNERGY SERVICES, INC. PROGRAM -- In conjunction with the Jackson County Prosecutor’s Office, Synergy Services developed a Diversion Specialty Court that focuses specifically on domestic violence offenders. Judges who have received domestic violence training will exclusively refer domestic violence (DV) offenders to Synergy's Jackson County BIP and Peaceful Path Diversion Program (BIP) to oversee the offenders’ progress. Synergy's BIP program staff provide individual offender assessments, group education treatment provided by the therapist and monitored case management provided by the Diversion Officer. Ninety percent of offenders will successfully complete the 42-week program.
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Child Protection Center

CHILD PROTECTION CENTER, INC. PROGRAM -- The mission of the Child Protection Center (CPC) is to respect the child and protect their voice throughout the investigation of child abuse. The CPC accomplishes its mission and program purpose by providing forensic interviews, family advocacy and mental health services to children ages 3-17 living in Jackson County, who are victims of sexual and physical abuse or who have witnessed a homicide or violent crimes and their non-offending caregivers. The CPC’s Program ensures that children who are victims of child abuse or witness to violent crimes are properly identified, that their statements are made through forensic interviews, and that they are ensured access to all necessary mental health treatments and social supports as soon as possible. In 2019, the CPC served 807 victims of child abuse. Of those, 672 were from Jackson County.
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Hope House Co-Responding Advocacy Program

HOPE HOUSE PROGRAM -- Hope House’s Co-Responding Advocacy Program is a new and innovative program that will close existing gaps in service by expanding services to meet the needs of domestic violence victims residing in Independence. By providing crisis intervention and supportive services at the time an incident occurs, the program will increase victims’ safety and create safer communities by holding offenders accountable. Ultimately, the program helps to break the cycle of violence. Project staff will provide on-scene supportive services for residents of Independence who contact the police department as a result of experiencing domestic violence.
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Hope House's Targeted Domestic Violence Program

HOPE HOUSE, INC. PROGRAM -- The Independence Strivin' Committee has identified the need to increase the community's capacity to ensure the safety and housing stability of survivors of domestic violence. Residents of Hawthorne Place Apartments who have experienced domestic violence need and deserve access to dedicated, full-time staff with training on the issues of domestic violence and trauma. Additionally, research shows that the most successful interventions need to be provided on-site and at the time they are needed to fully address survivors' current safety needs and barriers to housing stability. Hope House's Targeted Domestic Violence Program will address the identified need and bridge the current gap in services that has been identified by the Independence Strivin' Committee. Project staff will provide on-site advocacy and therapy services for residents of Hawthorne Place Apartments who are currently or have previously experienced domestic violence.
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Independence STRIVIN' Initiative

COMMUNITY SERVICES LEAGUE PROGRAM -- In 2017, CSL began its work in the Hawthorne Place Apartments & Townshomes providing employment coaching, financial coaching and income supports/direct assistance. In a little over three years, the program has grown to include Family Stability Coaching, forming a community group to create a Trauma Informed/Resiliency Community Plan, working with Independence Police (IPD) to create a Crisis Response Plan, and working with IPD and Hope House to begin door-to-door outreach for domestic violence victims. The Independence STRIVIN' area has expanded to include Northwest Indepenence and Sugar Creek. Located in the heart of this community, Blendwell is the CSL Work Life Center.
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Mattie Rhodes Violence Intervention & Prevention

MATTIE RHODES CENTER PROGRAM -- Violence is traumatic and disproportionately affects those living in low-income, disinvested neighborhoods. Mattie Rhodes Center VIP program is guided by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s framework for violence preventions: The Social-Ecological Model. This model reflects the complex interplay between individual, relationship, community, and societal factors and the necessity to act across multiple levels to reduce and prevent violence. The goal of these supports is to assist youth and families in making significant changes in their behavior to stop the cycle of violence, seek supportive/ intervention services,  prevent youth from engaging in future acts of violence resulting in long-term and widespread changes in the Northeast community, resulting in significant, and lasting effects. This additional COMBAT funding will be utilized to add a Clinical Therapist/Trauma Specialist to the VIP program.
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Melissa's Program

HEALING HOUSE PROGRAM -- "Melissa’s Program" is named after a previous participant in Healing House, Inc.'s recovery support services. Melissa was successfully discharged and returned to her batterer. She was murdered while their 7-year old child was upstairs. Melissa's Program will be dedicated to empowering survivors of domestic violence through the provision of safe housing, supportive counseling and advocacy services. Participants will receive recovery support services and a treatment plan that includes services for domestic violence. This program seeks to connect survivor participants with a nurturing community while enhancing their personal safety, independence, and self-esteem.
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MOSCA Services & Education To Address Sexual Violence

METROPOLITAN ORGANIZATION TO COUNTER SEXUAL ASSAULT PROGRAM -- In 2020 the State of Missouri passed Senate Bill 569, which includes the Sexual Assault Survivors’ Bill of Rights. The bill ensures that survivors have the right to consult with an employee or volunteer of a rape crisis center during any forensic examination and before participating in an interview with law enforcement or a prosecuting attorney. MOCSA has longstanding relationships with currently 19 hospitals in the six-county metropolitan area, which automatically dispatch MOCSA advocates to respond when a victim presents for a forensic examination. Whether these requests occur at noon or midnight, MOCSA is available whenever there is a need with 24-hour advocacy services.
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Reducing Compound Trauma In Hot Spots

CENTERS FOR CONFLICT RESOLUTION PROGRAM -- This project brings trauma-informed conflict resolution processes and training and restorative justice practices to children, youth and adults in four COMBAT-identified hot spots. This project serves approximately 600 people in schools, neighborhoods, families and courts. CCR participants are identified as having caused harm or having been harmed. They live, work or go to school in high crime and high violence areas. They have experienced individual, historical, societal, cultural or secondary trauma. Conflict resolution training and processes are a needed aspect of the full-scale intervention COMBAT is creating, making a direct contribution to violence prevention efforts by successfully promoting the idea that conflicts can be resolved without violence. Since conflict can and sometimes does lead to violence, conflict resolution effectively reduces violence.
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REVEAL Social & Mental Health Services

RECONCILIATION SERVICES PROGRAM -- REVEAL—Restore-Engage-Value-Encourage-Act-Lead—Program offers a comprehensive approach to individual and community healing through evidence-based therapeutic services under the direction of a Licensed Clinical Social Worker (LCSW). Reconciliation Services reaches individuals who would not seek therapeutic services elsewhere. The REVEAL Program provides an environment and services that seek to address violence prevention by increasing neighborhood strengths, encouraging pro-social behavior to build community cohesion, and addressing unmet community and individual needs for social and mental health services.
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Rose Brooks Bridge Program

ROSE BROOKS CENTER PROGRAM -- The Bridge Program systematically connects victims of domestic violence at local hospitals and clinics with immediate domestic violence services and resources in order to offer victims of intimate partner violence a life without abuse. This program connects with COMBAT’s focus on essential services for domestic violence survivors, including trauma counseling for survivors being made available as immediately as possible following the domestic violence occurrence. Also, survivors are fully informed of all resources and services available to them, including counseling, sheltering and victim advocacy.
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Rose Brooks Project SAFE

ROSE BROOKS CENTER PROGRAM -- Project SAFE is Rose Brooks Center’s school-based violence prevention program for children in preschool through 12th grade in Jackson County. Project SAFE carries out Rose Brooks’ mission to end the cycle of domestic violence by reaching at-risk youth in grades pre-K through 12th before they make the life choices that can reproduce the cycle of violence. The program helps students develop resiliency tools and skills necessary to avoid future violence perpetration or victimization. Rose Brooks Center first offered school-based prevention in 1997 in response to schools’ requests to support children with domestic violence trauma. For over 40 years, Rose Brooks Center has provided shelter and supportive services to adults and children impacted by domestic violence. Annually, Rose Brooks Center impacts approximately 14,000 local individuals through professional education and shelter, its hotline, and non-residential advocacy, clinical and prevention services.
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Sheffield Bullying/Violence Prevention

SHEFFIELD PLACE PROGRAM -- The mothers and children at Sheffield Place demonstrate the pervasive, negative effects of severe trauma. Like their mothers, the children bear deep emotional and often physical scars caused by exposure to pervasive alcohol and drug abuse; domestic violence; sexual, physical, emotional and verbal abuse; physical and emotional neglect; neighborhood violence; and the trauma of homelessness itself. Due to the trauma in their lives many of the children at Sheffield Place have the factors that put them at high risk for being bullied and/or bullying. The Bullying/Violence Prevention Project integrates education and skill development to address bullying and violence. The objectives include increasing awareness regarding bullying, teaching skills to combat bullying and empowering children through improved protective factors. The program also increases the mothers' knowledge of bullying and increase parenting skills.
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Trauma First Aid

HOUSING SERVICES OF KANSAS CITY PROGRAM -- Housing Services of Kansas City, a closely held 501(c)3 nonprofit of the Housing Authority of Kansas City, Missouri (HAKC), is creating a new Trauma First Aid Case Worker (TFAC) initiative to treat trauma experienced by Low Income Public Housing residents and break the cycle of domestic abuse and violence in Kansas City’s public housing. The TFAC Worker will be sited through HAKC’s Resident Services Department and work with HAKC Public Safety officers as they respond to incident reports from HAKC’s Low-Income Public Housing and Senior Developments. The TFAC worker will work intensively for 96-120 hours after a Domestic Violence or other traumatic incident to assist the client with immediate post-traumatic needs, accessing community services, and finding additional therapeutic services. After that time, the client’s case will be transferred to the Resident Opportunity and Self-Sufficiency program for follow-up services and case management.
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Using Physical Exercise To Treat Trauma

COMMUNITY SERVICES LEAGUE PROGRAM -- Trauma—sexual trauma, domestic violence, chronic poverty and other traumatic experiences—can be stored in a person’s muscles, stomach and brain. The body's inability to shut off the flood of hormones into the body, even when no threat is currently happening, keeps victims of severe trauma in this flood, adversely impacting their physical wellbeing. Community Services League will begin using physical exercise and brain science to encourage health and wellness for both children and adults. The exercise programs may include walking, running, dancing, group classes or individual teachings for those who have suffered from relational trauma and for those who hope to never experience it. Exercise is a way to address mental wellness without being mental health providers.
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Youth Guidiance BAM & WOW

YOUTH GUIDIANCE PROGRAM -- BAM and WOW are school-based strength-based, trauma-informed group counseling and clinical mentoring programs that seek to change the life trajectories of BYMOC and GYWOC in grades 6-12, who have been exposed to cycles of intergenerational poverty, violence, and trauma, in large part due to the racial inequities BIPOC communities in America face. Youth Guidance’s culturally competent school-based mental health and social-emotional models work with students who are at higher risk of school withdrawal and anti-social behaviors, so they can gain the skills and resources necessary to thrive in and beyond school. The COMBAT grant supports four full-time BAM & WOW Counselors in providing trauma-informed group counseling and mentoring services to 210 Hickman Mills C-1 School District students who have been exposed to domestic violence and other traumas, both directly and indirectly.
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