[House Hearing, 112 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]

U.S. DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE OFFICE ON VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN

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HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON CRIME, TERRORISM,
AND HOMELAND SECURITY

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED TWELFTH CONGRESS

SECOND SESSION

__________

FEBRUARY 16, 2012

__________

Serial No. 112-155

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Printed for the use of the Committee on the Judiciary

Available via the World Wide Web: http://judiciary.house.gov

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COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY

LAMAR SMITH, Texas, Chairman
F. JAMES SENSENBRENNER, Jr., JOHN CONYERS, Jr., Michigan
Wisconsin HOWARD L. BERMAN, California
HOWARD COBLE, North Carolina JERROLD NADLER, New York
ELTON GALLEGLY, California ROBERT C. ``BOBBY'' SCOTT,
BOB GOODLATTE, Virginia Virginia
DANIEL E. LUNGREN, California MELVIN L. WATT, North Carolina
STEVE CHABOT, Ohio ZOE LOFGREN, California
DARRELL E. ISSA, California SHEILA JACKSON LEE, Texas
MIKE PENCE, Indiana MAXINE WATERS, California
J. RANDY FORBES, Virginia STEVE COHEN, Tennessee
STEVE KING, Iowa HENRY C. ``HANK'' JOHNSON, Jr.,
TRENT FRANKS, Arizona Georgia
LOUIE GOHMERT, Texas PEDRO R. PIERLUISI, Puerto Rico
JIM JORDAN, Ohio MIKE QUIGLEY, Illinois
TED POE, Texas JUDY CHU, California
JASON CHAFFETZ, Utah TED DEUTCH, Florida
TIM GRIFFIN, Arkansas LINDA T. SANCHEZ, California
TOM MARINO, Pennsylvania JARED POLIS, Colorado
TREY GOWDY, South Carolina
DENNIS ROSS, Florida
SANDY ADAMS, Florida
BEN QUAYLE, Arizona
MARK AMODEI, Nevada

Sean McLaughlin, Majority Chief of Staff and General Counsel
Perry Apelbaum, Minority Staff Director and Chief Counsel
------

Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security

F. JAMES SENSENBRENNER, Jr., Wisconsin, Chairman

LOUIE GOHMERT, Texas, Vice-Chairman

BOB GOODLATTE, Virginia ROBERT C. ``BOBBY'' SCOTT,
DANIEL E. LUNGREN, California Virginia
J. RANDY FORBES, Virginia STEVE COHEN, Tennessee
TED POE, Texas HENRY C. ``HANK'' JOHNSON, Jr.,
JASON CHAFFETZ, Utah Georgia
TIM GRIFFIN, Arkansas PEDRO R. PIERLUISI, Puerto Rico
TOM MARINO, Pennsylvania JUDY CHU, California
TREY GOWDY, South Carolina TED DEUTCH, Florida
SANDY ADAMS, Florida SHEILA JACKSON LEE, Texas
MARK AMODEI, Nevada MIKE QUIGLEY, Illinois
JARED POLIS, Colorado

Caroline Lynch, Chief Counsel

Bobby Vassar, Minority Counsel

C O N T E N T S

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FEBRUARY 16, 2012

Page

OPENING STATEMENTS

The Honorable F. James Sensenbrenner, Jr., a Representative in
Congress from the State of Wisconsin, and Chairman,
Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security........ 1
The Honorable Robert C. ``Bobby'' Scott, a Representative in
Congress from the State of Virginia, and Ranking Member,
Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security........ 3
The Honorable Lamar Smith, a Representative in Congress from the
State of Texas, and Chairman, Committee on the Judiciary....... 4

WITNESS

Susan B. Carbon, Director, Office of Violence Against Women, U.S.
Department of Justice
Oral Testimony................................................. 6
Prepared Statement............................................. 8

U.S. DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE OFFICE ON VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN

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THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 16, 2012

House of Representatives,
Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism,
and Homeland Security,
Committee on the Judiciary,
Washington, DC.

The Subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 10 a.m., in room
2141, Rayburn Office Building, the Honorable F. James
Sensenbrenner, Jr., (Chairman of the Subcommittee) presiding.
Present: Representatives Sensenbrenner, Smith, Goodlatte,
Poe, Chaffetz, Gowdy, Adams, Scott, Johnson, and Chu.
Staff present: (Majority) Caroline Lynch, Subcommittee
Chief Counsel; Sarah Allen, Counsel; Harold Damelin, Counsel;
Allison Rose, Professional Staff Member, Lindsay Hamilton,
Clerk; (Minority) Bobby Vassar, Subcommittee Chief Counsel; Ron
LeGrand, Counsel; and Aaron Hiller, Counsel.
Mr. Sensenbrenner. The Subcommittee will be in order.
The Chair recognizes himself for an opening statement.
Good morning, Director Carbon, and welcome to the
Subcommittee.
Today we will conduct an oversight hearing on the Office of
Violence Against Women at the United States Department of
Justice, which you have headed since early 2010.
OVW was originally created in 1995 within the Office of
Justice Programs at the Justice Department to implement the
various grant programs established in 1994 by the passage of
the Violence Against Women Act. In 2003, the Attorney General
established OVW as a separate office outside of OJP where it
remains today.
The Violence Against Women Act, or VAWA, is an important
law that has helped countless numbers of victims across the
country deal with domestic violence and sexual assault. I have
been a strong supporter of the act from the time of its initial
passage and continuing through its two reauthorizations in 2000
and 2005, the last of which I was the principal author of.
VAWA established essential programs that support efforts to
prevent and prosecute crimes of domestic violence, dating
violence, sexual assault, and stalking, and to provide
assistance and services to the women who are the victims of
these crimes. Over the years, its reach has been expanded to
help both the young and the elderly. Across the Nation, OVW's
programs support the work of victim advocates, attorneys,
counselors, law enforcement personnel, prosecutors, health care
providers, and emergency shelters.
Since its inception, OVW has awarded over $4.7 billion in
grants and cooperative agreements to fund and support programs
established by the 1994 law and its subsequent
reauthorizations. Although there exists bipartisan support for
OVW's mission, in these very difficult economic times where the
Federal Government must drastically reduce its spending, we
simply cannot continue to allocate resources without verifying
that they are being used as effectively and efficiently as
possible.
In this context, today we examine OVW's grant programs and
the office's performance. I am interested to learn what the
office is doing to address possible duplication among the
different OVW grant programs and between other Justice
programs.
I am also interested to learn more about OVW's grant
oversight efforts. Both the Justice Department's Inspector
General and the General Accounting Office have identified what
I consider to be significant problems with respect to OVW's
grant management. Between 2005 and 2011, the IG conducted a
number of audits of OVW grant recipients. These reports detail
a series of violations of grant requirements ranging from very
significant amounts of unsupported or unallowable expenditures
to sloppy record keeping and failure to file required reports
accurately and in a timely manner.
The violations include a July 2010 grantee audit report
where the IG considered nearly $830,000 of an $890,000 OVW
grant as unsupported or unallowable expenditures; a March 2009
audit report of another OVW grantee about which the IG
questioned as unsupportable or unallowable expenditures of
$477,000 of a $681,000 OVW grant; and a September 2005 OVW
grantee audit report in which the IG found over $1.2 million of
a $1.9 million grant to be unsupportable or questionable
expenditures. This is all taxpayers' money that may not have
gone toward the intended purpose of helping victims of domestic
violence or sexual assault.
These IG reports cause me to wonder what grant monitoring
procedures OVW has in place that allowed this type of grant
abuse to occur. As we move forward, these problems need to be
addressed and corrected during the life of the grant, not after
the grant funds have already been expended and the IG comes in
to do an audit.
The acting IG recently testified before another House
Subcommittee on the topic of Federal grant program oversight.
In the course of her testimony, she referenced a 2010 audit of
OVW where several errors were found by OVW peer reviewers in
the calculation of the grant application scores, resulting in
the incorrect ranking of some grant applications and the
possible denial of grants to qualified applicants.
The IG also pointed out that the same audit report
discovered a number of instances where OVW peer reviewers were
not properly screened for potential conflicts of interest
before they were allowed to evaluate and score grant
applications.
Lastly, the IG pointed out a 2006 audit report dealing with
the grant close-out process in which the IG recommended that
OVW resolve $37 million in questioned costs and de-obligate
another $14 million. The IG noted that we have had multiple
communications with OVW since we issued our report in 2006, but
OVW has yet to fully resolve these recommendations.
These are serious concerns pointed out by the IG, and I
would like to know what OVW has done to address them. It is
essential that we be able to determine how effective VAWA
programs are and whether grantees are providing adequate
services for the amount of funding they receive. We need to be
sure that the population we are trying to help, the victims of
domestic violence and sexual assault, are actually getting the
services that they need.
I thank the director for appearing, and I now recognize the
Ranking Member of the Subcommittee, the gentleman from
Virginia, Mr. Scott.
Mr. Scott. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you for
holding this hearing on the Office of Violence Against Women.
And I thank Ms. Carbon for being with us today.
The Office of Violence Against Women was created
specifically to implement the Violence Against Women Act. By
fostering extensive partnerships, OVW facilitates the creation
of programs, policies, and practices aimed at ending domestic
violence, dating violence, sexual assault, and stalking.
Through formula programs, State coalitions, and discretionary
grant programs, OVW has been very successful in supporting
victims and holding perpetrators accountable through promoting
a coordinated community response.
Mr. Chairman, we have the responsibility to make sure that
the grant programs are being administered effectively, and in
July 2010, as part of an audit report, the Department of
Justice's Office of Inspector General concluded that OVW worked
quickly to make Recovery Act grants through a broad range of
initiatives and that the grant selection process was
transparent and objective.
The OIG's report cited five areas for improvement that
included adjustments in the peer review process, tighter
internal controls, more effective maintenance, and others, and
OVW has concurred and has made the recommended changes. OVW's
commitment to effectively managing its grant programs is
demonstrated by the adoption of the OIG's recommendations and
the establishment of a grants financial management division.
This unit enables OVW to be much more proactive, scrutinize
budgets more closely, and identify other issues before they
become problems.
OVW programs and services have not only provided lifesaving
services for victims and their children across the country, but
have also yielded significant monetary benefits and averted
victimization costs. A 2002 University of North Carolina cost-
benefit analysis of the Violence Against Women Act of 1994
reported the net benefit of the bill is estimated to be $16.4
billion. Because the cost is only $1.6 billion, $14.8 billion
in averted victimization costs would be saved after the
implementation of the act. On an individual level, VAWA is
estimated to cost about $15.50 per U.S. woman and would be
expected to save over $159 per woman in averted costs of
criminalization. And so this shows that this is a fiscally
responsible program.
And it is still needed. In Virginia, one our of three
homicides are related to family and intimate partner violence.
Domestic violence programs in Virginia are seeing an escalation
of violence resulting in increased demand for services.
According to the Department of Justice, the rate of domestic
violence triples when economic strain increases. The dynamics
that fuel domestic violence can be exacerbated by an abuser
cycling in and out of employment and a family's inability to
pay bills and the threat of losing housing.
When asked, through a statewide survey of recipients of
Virginia's domestic violence services, the question was asked,
what would you have done if the shelter had not existed? 22
percent of service recipients indicated that they would have
been homeless. 21 percent said they would have been compelled
to return to their abusers, and 10 percent believed that they
would be dead by now at the hands of their abusers.
The Virginia Sexual and Domestic Violence Alliance reports
that in 2009, agencies located in my congressional district
responded to almost 12,000 hotline calls, provided advocacy
services for over 2,000 adults and 664 children, provided
emergency shelter to 427 adults and 400 children, but they had
to turn away 148 families in my congressional district due to
lack of shelter.
Additionally in 2009, almost half the victims receiving
advocacy services reported that they had missed time from work
or school or lost income as a result, and 28 percent of victims
receiving services had to relocate or became homeless as a
result of domestic violence.
So, Director Carbon, we look forward to your testimony and
look forward to continuing to work with you.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Sensenbrenner. The Chair recognizes the Chairman of the
full Committee, the gentleman from Texas, Mr. Smith.
Mr. Smith. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Office of Violence Against Women, which Director Carbon
has headed since early 2010, plays an important role in our
ongoing battle against domestic violence, dating violence,
stalking, and sexual assault. It administers and oversees the
various programs authorized by the Violence Against Women Act,
also known as VAWA, and I have been a strong supporter of the
act since its enactment in 1994.
The Office on Violence Against Women was last authorized in
2006. Today's hearing is the first step in the Judiciary
Committee's review of VAWA and consideration of its
reauthorization.
The Federal Government faces significant long-term
budgetary constraints. Agencies must get by with less. In this
environment, the Office on Violence Against Women must focus
its resources on its most efficient programs that allow it to
accomplish the greatest good. Congress will not fund programs
that are ineffective or waste money.
But with that in mind, I hope the testimony today will
highlight what this legislation has allowed the office to
accomplish.
I also look forward to hearing your thoughts, Director
Carbon, on how the grant programs can be streamlined,
consolidated, or even eliminated to achieve the greatest
efficiencies possible.
I would like to mention two examples that demonstrate how
this legislation has helped many people.
In February 1996, after having been authorized by the act,
the Austin, Texas-based Texas Council on Family Violence
launched the National Domestic Violence Hotline. Since that
time, the group has answered nearly 2.5 million calls and saved
many injuries and lives. The hotline is a life line for victims
of domestic violence and their families. Over the past 15
years, the hotline has provided victims with crisis counseling,
information on legal advocacy, shelters, and health care
facilities. When a victim has the courage to reach out for
help, the hotline is there to guide them to a safe place and
connect them to the resources they need. The National Domestic
Violence Hotline is one of the most important services we can
offer individuals and families who are in crisis. I am glad to
have this beacon of hope in my home State of Texas.
The Bexar County Family Justice Center opened its doors in
August 2005, thanks to funding from VAWA. The center currently
occupies over 11,000 square feet of office space in downtown
San Antonio. Today it has over 40 on- and off-site partners who
use a local coordinated community response to deal with the
problem of domestic violence and provide comprehensive service
to victims. These services include assistance with law
enforcement and prosecution, employment and educational
services, counseling, civil legal services, child care and
therapy, health care, food, clothing, and housing assistance
and emergency shelter. Each client of the center has the
ability to see any service provider at no charge. The center
serves over 3,700 adults and 2,700 children a year. It is
essential that programs like these are in place to protect
victims not just from physical bruises but from the emotional
and mental scars as well.
Funding through VAWA has helped women escape abuse and
rebuild their lives. I hope that this hearing will bring to
light ways that we can continue and improve programs through
the Office on Violence Against Women.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back.
Mr. Sensenbrenner. I thank the Chairman.
Without objection, all Members' opening statements will be
included in the record at this point.
I will now introduce today's witness. Susan Carbon is
Director of the Justice Department's Office of Violence Against
Women, or OVW. Prior to serving as director of OVW, she served
as supervisory judge of the New Hampshire Judicial Branch,
Family Division from 1996 to 2010. Director Carbon was also a
member of the Governor's Commission on Domestic and Sexual
Violence and chaired New Hampshire's Domestic Violence Fatality
Review Committee. She also served as president of the National
Council Juvenile and Family Court Judges from 2007 to 2008 and
was the president of the New Hampshire State Bar Association in
1993 and 1994.
She is a graduate of the University of Wisconsin, Madison,
and then she didn't stay in Wisconsin to pay income taxes that
helped pay for her education and left for the DePauw University
College of Law. [Laughter.]
The witness' written statement will be entered into the
record in its entirety. I ask that Ms. Carbon summarize her
testimony in 5 minutes or less, and to help you stay within
that time limit, you have got the blinking lights in front of
you. I now recognize Ms. Carbon.

TESTIMONY OF SUSAN B. CARBON, DIRECTOR, OFFICE OF VIOLENCE
AGAINST WOMEN, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE

Ms. Carbon. Thank you very much, Chairman Sensenbrenner--
and I will do my best to assure that taxes are paid--Chairman
Smith, Ranking Member Scott, and Members of the Committee, for
the opportunity to speak with you today about the work of the
Office on Violence Against Women, or OVW, and the success of
the Violence Against Women Act programs.
Although violent crime generally has decreased nationwide,
domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, and
stalking, the crimes which are the focus of our office, still
devastate the lives of an extraordinary number of women, men,
youth, and children. One in five women have been raped in their
lifetimes. One in four women and one in seven men have
experienced severe physical violence at the hands of an
intimate partner.
Given the long-term consequences for victims, their
children, and our communities, the grant programs authorized
under VAWA are an investment in our Nation's future, and we are
immensely grateful for your support over these past 18 years.
OVW-administered VAWA funding has led to significant
improvements in the civil and criminal justice systems
encouraging victims to report these crimes, improving evidence
collection in sexual assault and domestic violence cases, and
increasing the issuance and enforcement of protection orders.
With OVW leadership, communities are forging effective
partnerships across disciplines to help victims reclaim their
lives and hold offenders accountable.
For instance, an OVW-funded law enforcement officer in
Dauphin County, Pennsylvania reports that a new partnership
with a victim advocate allows him--and I quote--to obtain more
detailed statements and collect evidence, which might have been
initially overlooked, and then to bring more serious charges.
Many victims also first turn to their faith communities. So
the City of Spartanburg, South Carolina has used OVW funds to
train 230 ministers to date on effective responses to domestic
violence.
The impact of this OVW programming is evident. The
increased availability of legal services has contributed to a
significant reduction in domestic violence. Obtaining a
protection order has been shown in several studies to reduce
future assault and enhance victim safety and well-being. 4
years after Milwaukee implemented a specialized prosecution
unit, felony convictions had increased five-fold. Thanks to
these types of programs, FBI data showed that between 1993 and
2010, the number of individuals killed by an intimate partner
declined 30 percent for women and 66 percent for men.
These programs not only save lives, they save money. A 2002
study found that by reducing these crimes and the subsequent
costs to the criminal justice and health care systems, VAWA
saved an estimated $12.6 billion in net averted social costs in
its first 6 years alone.
As a family court judge in New Hampshire, I saw firsthand
what can happen when VAWA services such as legal assistance and
transitional housing are not always available. Not only did I
see the adults back in my courtroom, but I also saw their
children in child protection cases and their teens in drug
court and on our delinquency dockets. VAWA's most profound
impact and outcome may be breaking the cycle of violence by
reaching children and youth.
We at OVW are committed to using every dollar of VAWA
funding prudently. We take very seriously our grant-making
responsibilities and we are dedicated to managing our grant
programs effectively and with transparency. As my written
statement reflects, I have instituted several changes to our
policies and practices that reflect my commitment to sound
financial management.
The difficult economy has brought challenges to both
victims and the programs that serve them. States are struggling
to keep shelters and rape crisis centers open, as well as
maintain police, prosecutors, probation officers, and even
judges. Now more than ever, we must invest in innovative ways
to prevent violence. OVW is using the most current research to
target our resources. New initiatives, such as preventing
domestic violence homicides, and funding the Austin, Texas-
based National Dating Abuse Help Line to include text
messaging. Since launching that text capacity last September,
the help line has conducted over 10,000 chat and text
conversations with young people in need.
I cannot stress enough how critical it is for Congress to
reauthorize VAWA once again and to use this opportunity to
sustain and strengthen our Nation's commitment and capacity to
end violence against women. I look forward to continuing to
work with you to improve OVW administration and our grant
programs to combat sexual assault, domestic violence, dating
violence, and stalking.
I thank you very much for your interest in this critically
important work, and I am very happy to take your questions.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Carbon follows:]

__________

Mr. Sensenbrenner. Thank you very much, Ms. Carbon.
I will begin by recognizing myself for 5 minutes.
In my opening statement, I referred to a number of audits
that had been done that indicate that a lot of the money in
some of the grants that had been audited ended up being
unsubstantiated or wasted. That is a matter of concern to all
of us on this Committee because all of us support the thrust of
these programs. Every time a VAWA reauthorization has come up,
there has been overwhelming bipartisan support for it.
There is a cloud over the program not in what its goals are
but in how it has been administered. What are you and your
office doing to make sure that we do not have any more really
awful audit reports from the IG that we have had in the past
few years?
Ms. Carbon. Thank you, Chairman Sensenbrenner.
We take this issue extremely seriously, and we have no more
interest than you in seeing that there be any fraud, waste, or
abuse of any Federal taxpayer money. In my view, it is
critically important that the funds that Congress appropriates
go to the victims and to our communities to make them safer. So
we have taken several steps in our office to ensure that we
address these concerns and welcome the opportunity to work with
you and others to shore them up. Let me give you a number of
examples.
The first I would begin with is----
Mr. Sensenbrenner. Don't have a long litany because I have
5 minutes and I have got two follow-up questions on that.
Ms. Carbon. Let me tell you that we have established our
own grants financial management division which has been able to
provide a great deal of expertise to our grantees.
We have also looked into--you speak to the issue of the
audits. We have looked into those very carefully and worked
with the IG to resolve those concerns, and I am happy to give
you detail later if you wish.
Mr. Sensenbrenner. Could you please do that in writing? And
without objection, it will be included in the record.
[The information referred to follows:]

__________

Ms. Carbon. Certainly.
In addition to our grants financial management division, we
work with the OIG to train our new grantees to ensure that they
will understand what the requirements are so that they will not
be in a situation where they may unwittingly make mistakes on
how they report and handle all of their financial management
responsibilities.
We have also adopted a monitoring manual for all of our
program staff to ensure that they are giving appropriate
guidance and that we are collecting all of the information
which the OIG has requested.
Mr. Sensenbrenner. Now, the DOJ has got an Office of Audit
Assessment and Management, which is called the OAAM for short.
And their job is to look at audits and figure out how to do a
better job. Has the OVW sought the assistance of the OAAM, and
if so, how successful has this been?
Ms. Carbon. Actually we do work with OAAM. That is a part
of the Office of Justice Programs where OVW used to be. We have
no interest in seeing redundancies, so we do work with OAAM
when it is appropriate. One example is the high-risk grantee
list which we have worked with OJP, COPS, and our office to
determine those grantees that need additional assistance and
additional oversight.
Mr. Sensenbrenner. Now, when I was on the Science Committee
as the Chairman, there are an awful lot of grants that the
various agencies under the Science Committee's jurisdiction
pass out. And then-Ranking Member George Brown and I were very,
very supportive of the peer review system. In my opening
statement, I indicated that there had been problems with people
who have been peer reviewers. Have those problems been solved,
and if not, why not?
Ms. Carbon. Yes, they have been solved.
Mr. Sensenbrenner. Good.
Now, the final point--it is more of a macro issue--is the
concern about overlap and duplication of effort with OJP and
with the COPS program. I think everybody is going to have tough
budget times as we get through the deficit problems. One of the
ways we can keep the money flowing to help victims is to make
sure it is not wasted in duplication of effort.
What is being done with the other two agencies within
Justice to put an end to duplication of effort?
Ms. Carbon. Within the other offices, OJP and COPS? I am
sorry.
Mr. Sensenbrenner. Yes.
Ms. Carbon. I can speak to what we do with regard to that.
Our mission is very different from the other missions. I can
tell you that when we review our grant applications, one of the
questions which we ask in our solicitations is the extent to
which grantees are seeking or have received funds from our
office.
We share a monitoring list which has all of the grantees
between COPS, OJP, and OVW, but specifically with regard to
what the other offices may do, I would have to respond further
to you because I do not have that level of detail.
Mr. Sensenbrenner. Thank you. And without objection, that
will be placed in the record as well.*
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*The information referred to was not received by the Subcommittee
at the time this hearing record was submitted for printing on February
19, 2013.
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Mr. Sensenbrenner. The gentleman from Virginia, Mr. Scott.
Mr. Scott. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Ms. Carbon, on these audits that found deficiencies, this
was not your office but was in the grantees'. Is that right?
They weren't auditing your office. They were auditing your
grantees.
Ms. Carbon. Yes. The OIG audits our grantees.
Mr. Scott. And that is where they found the irregularities,
not in your office itself.
Ms. Carbon. Correct.
Mr. Scott. Now, what portion of the grantees are government
agencies and how many are volunteer groups?
Ms. Carbon. I don't know that I have that breakdown. We
fund State and local governments. We fund nonprofit
organizations. We fund educational institutions. I would be
happy to get you that figure, but I apologize I don't have
that.
Mr. Scott. If you could, because State and local
governments ought to have enough accounting capability.
[The information referred to follows:]

__________

Mr. Scott. But do you check the accounting capability of
your potential grantees before you give them grants to make
sure that they could follow through?
Ms. Carbon. Absolutely. That is a part of the application
process. When a grantee applies, we look at their budgets. We
look at their accounting practices. We look at their policies.
We also continue to review. If we determine that we may award a
grant to them, we continue to review along the way and we will
work with them throughout the course of the award as well.
Mr. Scott. Now, the auditors have made recommendations. Did
you accept and implement all of those recommendations?
Ms. Carbon. Almost universally, yes. And the only reason I
give you a caution is that we may have a disagreement with them
and the OIG may agree that the recommendation ought not to have
been made. Short of that, yes, we do work with them and resolve
all issues.
Mr. Scott. Generally speaking, what do you do for
prevention, not just follow up after domestic violence? What do
you do to prevent domestic violence?
Ms. Carbon. We have programs to address prevention. That is
an area that we believe is critically important because if we
don't begin prevention, we are never going to break that cycle
of violence.
Some of the prevention programs we have are in our Engaging
Men program and in how we work with our children's programs
because we find that it is important that we are getting
services earlier on so that we can begin to stem that tide.
Some of our grant programs deal with that directly; others deal
with it indirectly through intervention services. But one
example would be through our new help line. Another example is
through the Children Exposed to Violence program, and a third
would be our Engaging Men program.
Mr. Scott. Can you tell us generally why OVW needs to be a
separate office, not combined with others?
Ms. Carbon. The Office on Violence Against Women has a very
distinct mission. We are established to be the leading voice on
responding to crimes of violence against women, and Congress
recognized the importance of making a very strong statement,
back in 1994 when VAWA was first established and then in 2002
when OVW was made an independent office, that the crimes of
violence are incredibly important and that we recognize and
give attention. When we focus and have that specialized office,
we can dedicate the time and resources to it.
We have recognized that it is critically important that
this office focus on a whole different process than other
offices within the Department of Justice do. Our mission is to
address victim safety, offender accountability, and build
strong communities through the coordinated community response.
We don't believe that we have duplication, and we don't believe
that by being separate that we are in any way inefficient. And
to the contrary, we believe that being independent gives us a
very strong, distinct voice within the Federal Government,
across the country, and in fact, internationally as well.
Mr. Scott. And if you were combined with another agency,
you would lose that focus?
Ms. Carbon. Yes, yes, absolutely.
Mr. Scott. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Sensenbrenner. The gentleman from Utah, Mr. Chaffetz.
Mr. Chaffetz. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Ms. Carbon. Good morning.
Mr. Chaffetz. Hi. Good morning. Thank you for being here. I
appreciate the work that you and your staff do. It is very
important work and vital and makes a real difference in a lot
of people's lives.
I just want to touch briefly on a couple different topics.
I wanted to, at least initially, draw your attention to these
biennial reports to Congress that seem to have a previous
pattern at least of tardiness. I just wanted to get your
briefest of comments on that and just a commitment that these
reports will be a little bit more timely.
Ms. Carbon. Very briefly, yes. The reports, I am very happy
to report, are now all current with the exception of one that
we hope to have to you by the end of the month, and I will do
my level best to ensure from this point forward they all remain
current.
Mr. Chaffetz. Thank you.
Perhaps this is included in some of those reports, but if
your staff could help me. I would love to see, perhaps over the
last 2 to 3 years, a geographical map of where these grants are
given, and if you could help me visually see in a synopsis form
where these grants go. I worry sometimes that we get so diluted
that you look at a big, heavy topic--and you know, you could
pick probably any one of these, and we get so diffused. Do we
really make a difference when there are just so few dollars
going here or there? I am not saying I am advocating more
dollars, but it is curious to me as to whether or not more
focus would be more effective and then being able to spread
that out. I would just like to see a geographical map of the
grants over the last few years. If you could help me with that,
I would appreciate it.
The next point I wanted to make is you obviously have had
some concerns with the amount that is spent on these
conferences. I realize it is a minor portion of the budget, but
it goes to the frugalness of using dollars. I know you are
fairly new to this position, but I wanted to get your
perspective on what you plan to do to help rein in. There is
this one event, for instance, that there were $70,000 for a 5-
day conference attended by 60 people. It just seemed like an
excessive amount of money to spend on event planning and wanted
to get your brief comment on that.
Ms. Carbon. Let me respond twofold. First of all, we
certainly take the issue of conference costs very seriously. We
have adopted within our office, and I think you will find
across the Department as well, a new approval process for all
of the conferences so that depending upon the expense for the
conference, it is a different level of review. We have also
established strict limitations with regard to food and
beverage, and we are also giving guidance to grantees in
securing locations so that they can minimize that conference
cost as well.
There are some conferences and some events where you can do
training very effectively and very efficiently through a
webinar, but there are also some where you really need in-
person training. Where you are trying to change behavior, to
change practice, having face time with people can be critically
important to change that kind of behavioral programming. So we
are very mindful and we target dollars on those kinds of
events, minimize where we can.
Mr. Chaffetz. And I appreciate it. We will not know the
improvements that you make unless you tell us, and so along the
way, if you could share those with us, that would be important.
I want to go quickly to DNA backlogs. Where within this
would that fall? Is that something that you have engaged in? I
am concerned about these DNA backlogs, the processing of DNA
after violence. There have been concerns in certain pockets of
the country, particularly in California, where sometimes these
DNA samples have not been tested. The expense for conducting
these DNA tests--is this something that you all are engaged in?
Where would that fall within these groups of programs?
Ms. Carbon. It generally falls within, actually, other
parts of the Department, but we are very concerned that when
there is an act of sexual assault, that there can be a test
done promptly if the victim wishes for that to be done. And I
think that is one distinction that is important to make because
some people are not always ready to begin and engage the
criminal justice process. But there are other parts of the
Department that are--you know, NIJ, for example.
Mr. Chaffetz. So why wouldn't this fall within your area of
expertise?
Ms. Carbon. The DNA testing itself is--just happens to be
how the Department has allocated resources. Part of that is
OVC. Part of it is NIJ. But it certainly is a concern of ours
to ensure, and in programming and policies that we have through
our sexual assault services program and as well through the
SAFE Protocol, it is important that we ensure that those tests
be done promptly. The funding of those typically does not come
out of our grant programs, though.
Mr. Chaffetz. And, Mr. Chairman, last question. I am sorry.
I can't see the lights.
Mr. Sensenbrenner. 10 seconds.
Mr. Chaffetz. Homicide reduction. What can you possibly do
with $4 million, and homicide reduction is one of the
categories here.
Ms. Carbon. We can do a lot. There is a lot of very good
research that shows what can be done to reduce homicide through
lethality assessments, through different coordinated responses,
through different levels of risk intervention with victims
whether they come to hospitals or law enforcement, and how we
design those programs through the reduction or through fatality
review committees and other initiatives and have a significant
impact on reducing domestic homicide.
Mr. Chaffetz. Thanks, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Sensenbrenner. The time of the gentleman has expired.
The gentlewoman from California, Ms. Chu.
Ms. Chu. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Well, I was once a rape crisis counselor and I went to
emergency rooms to advocate for rape victims. So as you can
imagine, I am very interested in the reauthorization of VAWA.
And I was also very interested in the release of the Center
for Disease Control National Intimate Partner and Sexual
Violence Survey. This survey collected all kinds of detailed
information on sexual violence, stalking, and intimate partner
violence, victimization of adult women and men in the United
States and gave a truer picture of violence against women and
men that goes beyond the definition that has existed for the
last decade, which was indeed a limited one.
This survey is the first of its kind and it found, amongst
other things, that if you include all forms of sexual violence,
that one in two women have experienced sexual violence, and
also that one in five men have experienced a form of sexual
violence other than rape in their lifetime. And I would like to
enter this survey into the record.
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Ms. Chu. Well, as you know, the FBI's definition of rape
was revised in December of last year. This revision marked the
first update to the Federal definition in nearly a century.
Rape is now defined as any kind of penetration of another
person regardless of gender without the victim's consent.
How has the Office of Violence Against Women responded to
this long-awaited revision?
Ms. Carbon. Thank you, Representative. We worked very
closely with the FBI to institute this change and we were very
proud that we were able to work with them in doing so.
We are in the process--the responsibility actually falls
under the house of the FBI's Criminal Justice Information
Services Division there. We are working with them to design the
manner in which this change can actually be implemented through
their data systems and will continue to work with them over the
spring and into the summer. And then we will also be working
with our technical assistance providers to give guidance to law
enforcement and prosecutors and others about how to implement
that change. But this was a change which we greatly welcomed
and were very proud to be a part of.
Ms. Chu. Well, let me ask about immigrant victims. Many
people believe that the immigrant victim provisions in VAWA in
the reauthorization bill are a brand new expansion, but in
reality those provisions have been in VAWA since 1994. So I
know that you have been implementing some of these, but I still
feel like there are gaps in the service. Could you talk about
what you are doing to address immigrant victims of sexual
violence and what more could be done?
Ms. Carbon. That is an excellent question. Thank you.
All of our grant programs--most of our grant programs--
serve immigrant women, and we want to do and we continue to
train on the unique needs that immigrant women face. We have
also encouraged, through our solicitation process, that--and in
fact, a particular concern this year is that we want to make
sure we are reaching underserved communities. In many of the
reports that we receive of the evaluations of our programs, we
find that immigrant women continue to be underserved. So we are
asking our grantees to reach out to make sure that they are
looking in their communities, making their resources available
to all women, immigrants included. So it is extremely important
that we do so.
We also do so from another angle, which is language access.
Many immigrants come to this country and do not speak English
or don't speak it well, and we have worked very aggressively
throughout the Department, not just our office, in ensuring
that immigrant women can have all services in a language which
they can understand so they can have full access to those
services. If they walk into a courtroom and they don't
understand what is happening and I or somebody else have not
ensured that they have an interpreter, then I have not done my
job. And we are asking our grantees to ensure that across the
board as they do their job.
Ms. Chu. And I would also like to ask about sexual assault.
Most of the money from the Violence Against Women Act from the
first decade was dedicated to domestic violence. However,
sexual assault is, of course, equally important. So please
share with us what your office is doing to address sexual
violence.
Ms. Carbon. We are ensuring that sexual violence is
addressed in all of our grant programs where it is appropriate
for them to be, but across the board. We also are instituting a
number of different programs within the office, but in
particular, you will be aware that the sexual assault services
program, which Congress funded recently, is reaching
communities across the country. We also have a special
demonstration initiative looking at sexual assault,
particularly in rural and tribal communities, to shore up those
resources and then develop best practices that we can spread
across the country. But we are asking that all of the programs
make sure that they are serving victims of sexual assault, as
well as victims of domestic violence, and we often find that
there is a very significant overlap between the two.
Mr. Sensenbrenner. The time of the gentlewoman has expired.
The gentleman from Texas, Mr. Poe.
Mr. Poe. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Ms. Carbon. Good morning.
Mr. Poe. Thank you for being here.
Director Carbon, last year I sent you a letter asking you
some questions, and it is one page. And I have received from
your office, Assistant Attorney General Ronald Welch, a five-
page, single-spaced, looks like 3-point font response. And you
answered all my questions. So I do not want to mislead anyone
thinking that I am complaining about your response. You
directly answered every question I had.
Mr. Sensenbrenner. Will the gentleman yield?
Mr. Poe. Yes.
Mr. Sensenbrenner. Does the gentleman want to put the
response in the record?
Mr. Poe. I ask unanimous consent.
Mr. Sensenbrenner. Without objection.
Mr. Poe. The letter and the response.
Mr. Sensenbrenner. Without objection.
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Mr. Poe. All right.
Ms. Carbon. Thank you.
Mr. Poe. I appreciate the work your office does. I will
probably shock some of my friends in that I actually believe we
should consider expanding the role of your office, even
financially.
No one likes waste, fraud, and abuse. Based on the comments
you responded to in the letter, you don't like it either and
you want to get a hold of these grants and these people who
received the grants and eliminate them from the system. I
commend you on that and keep doing it.
In my other life, I was down at the courthouse in Houston
for a long time, called the Palace of Perjury. And I have been
around so long that I remember when domestic violence was
treated by law enforcement as a family problem, not as a social
health issue or a crime, but it is a family problem. I am glad
we have moved away from that concept.
Tell me about your education process of educating police
officers, prosecutors, and judges on this issue.
Ms. Carbon. Thank you. That is a great question, and having
been a former judge, I can speak from that side of the fence as
well.
We have a very aggressive program throughout OVW to educate
all of the professionals who interface with victims of sexual
assault, domestic violence, dating violence, and stalking. We
do this through technical assistance with our technical
assistance providers--we call them TA providers--by doing
institutes, sometimes in-service training, sometimes technical
assistance training. Sometimes it is through bringing groups
together as a group of law enforcement officers. Other times it
is in interdisciplinary fashions because it is important that
as a coordinated community response is implemented, that people
understand what each other's responsibilities are. But we have
a number of technical assistance providers geared explicitly
for law enforcement training as we do with judges and
advocates.
Speaking to the Judicial Institute, for example, we bring
judges from around the country together, bring in law
enforcement officers. We bring in other judges. We bring in
psychologists. We bring in hosts of people to educate judges
about how to better respond and to understand the dynamics that
are involved. That same process of institute development is
done with other professions as well.
But there may be occasions where we will send a technical
assistance provider directly to a law enforcement agency to
work with that unit in their home turf. It is not necessarily
always at a big conference, and I want to make sure that is
very clear. We work one on one as needed.
Mr. Poe. A couple of quick questions. There are those who
claim that this legislation demands and requires mandatory
arrests. That is just not true, is it?
Ms. Carbon. No, that is not true.
Mr. Poe. It is a State-by-State issue. So that is just
another myth about VAWA. Is that correct?
Ms. Carbon. It does not require mandatory arrest. However,
we do ask, because it is through the arrest program, so if
there is a grantee for that program, they certify that they
have policies or procedures or laws in place that would
encourage mandatory or encourage arrest but only upon probable
cause that an arrest should be made.
Mr. Poe. When a crime has been committed.
Ms. Carbon. Right.
Mr. Poe. Or probable cause that a crime has been committed.
Ms. Carbon. That is often lost.
Mr. Poe. The title, ``Violence Against Women Act,'' also
deals with males, does it not?
Ms. Carbon. It absolutely does, yes.
Mr. Poe. And there are the same services provided under the
act in your office that help men, and that is violence against
men as against women. Is that correct?
Ms. Carbon. That is correct, yes.
Mr. Poe. Is there any reason in your opinion to change the
name of the act?
Ms. Carbon. No. There is no reason to.
Mr. Poe. And so let me ask you one other question talking
about dealing with judges. You are familiar with the case from
Maryland, domestic violence victim, who--the judge didn't give
her a restraining order she asked for against her husband. And
so he came into her business and literally set her on fire. A
wonderful lady. And we are not talking about statistics here.
We are talking about real people that are hurt by others who
claim they love these people.
In your education of judges, do you talk about the use of
restraining orders and items to keep people separated until a
divorce is pending? Do you talk to judges about that?
Ms. Carbon. We absolutely do. In fact, I personally was
involved in chairing a national effort to develop a guide on
the issuance and enforcement of civil protection orders. So I
have both a great personal as well as professional interest in
seeing this. We do educate judges all across the country on
this and continue to do so.
Mr. Sensenbrenner. The time of the gentleman has expired.
The gentleman from Georgia, Mr. Johnson.
Mr. Johnson. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Ms. Carbon, thank you for appearing before the Committee
today. I appreciate the work that you do with the Office of
Violence Against Women. The services that you provide to
responding to domestic violence and sexual assault are vital.
Because of your work, hundreds of thousands of victims have
been served and thousands of arrests have been made. So I want
to thank you for your diligence.
I am heartened by the remarks of my colleague, Judge Poe,
in terms of his understanding of the fact that there is a
problem and he understands the extent of the problem and he
even understands the fact that the Federal Government has an
interest and a role to play in that regard as far as funding is
concerned.
And so I wanted to ask you a couple of questions.
Number one, I know that there have been some oversight
hearings on the other side of the Capitol about this program. I
think Senator Grassley argued that in terms of VAWA
reauthorization--he argued that during these difficult economic
times, we simply can't continue to allocate resources without
verifying that the resources are being used effectively and
efficiently as possible, kind of throwing a little cold water
on the efforts of your group. And I know we are in a fiscally
very conservative time right now.
I want you to talk about the domestic violence shelters. In
Georgia, they turned away 2,636 victims and their children due
to a lack of available space in 2010. And this is because of
cuts from State governments, cuts from local governments, and
cuts from the charitable giving community. And I would like for
you to explain how your grants, grants to your organization,
assist in helping these shelters.
And also I want you to take a minute to address gun
violence. Between 1990 and 2005, guns were used to kill more
than two-thirds of spouses and ex-spouses who were victims of
domestic violence. Last year, this Committee, the full
Committee, reported out H.R. 822, the National Right to Carry
Reciprocity Act of 2011. It was considered by this Committee
shortly after a lady out in California at hair shop where she
did hair, a beautician, was stalked and then killed by her
estranged husband. And I think seven other people were killed
also in that rampage. And we were considering at that time a
bill that I opposed. It would have allowed States to--or it
would have allowed a Federal permit essentially to carry guns
in States that may not allow persons who have been convicted of
domestic violence from being able to get a license for a
weapon.
Can you comment on all of that for me?
Ms. Carbon. Under Federal law, if--I am not clear on the
permitting process because that typically is done by local and
State government. But on the issue of under either civil
protection orders or under criminal cases, I am happy to
address the firearms issue there.
If there is a protective order in place, for example, the
offender is not permitted to have access or possession.
Mr. Johnson. Yes. Well, now, under the National Right to
Carry Reciprocity Act of 2011, I don't know if I would agree
with your current assessment if that law passes. But at any
rate, effect on domestic violence shelters.
Ms. Carbon. With regard to shelters, the Health and Human
Services Department funds the shelters. We fund transitional
housing programs and emergency housing. So we work in
collaborative ways with them.
But I would agree with you the need for shelters is dire.
We do not have enough beds. They are chronically under-funded,
and it is a great problem. So I share that concern.
Mr. Sensenbrenner. The gentleman's time has expired.
The gentlewoman from Florida, Mrs. Adams.
Mrs. Adams. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I agree that we have come a long way from the times when we
thought that spousal abuse and everything else was a family
matter, from someone who has firsthand experience as a law
enforcement officer and other things.
But I do have some questions because I do recognize this
program. I have been in the State and dealt with it on many
levels, both as a law enforcement officer and as a State
legislator. So I am just going to go through a few things.
OVW was designed to be an office separate from DOJ's two
major grant-making components, OJP and COPS. And the DOJ IG has
reported areas where these distinctions have caused overlap and
duplication in grant administration.
In what ways might consolidation of these offices,
particularly with regard to sharing systems, procedures, other
administrative processes, yield greater grant oversight and
coordination and reduce costs, therefore allowing more money to
go where it needs to be and that is the grants?
Ms. Carbon. We share the concern that we not have any
redundancies in the grant-making components. Two things I would
like to stress here.
Number one, we do have common areas where we do work--for
example, the grants management system, the computerized system
for applications, is something we share in common. We share the
high-risk grantee list. There are a few other things.
But by having our own grants financial management
division--I think this is critically important--we believe we
can provide a better service to the grantees because of having
more specialized staff, more specialized training, and more
specialized technical assistance so that, indeed, the grantees
can be using the funds as you all intended they be. Victims are
getting the services and the communities are being better
served as a result of this.
Mrs. Adams. And getting to the grants, GAO in reports and
testimony has pointed out that the difficulties in evaluating
effectiveness of various viable grants because grantees either
do not collect, maintain, and report required information to
OVW or the data provided to OVW by grantees is often difficult
to evaluate given varying definitions among different programs.
It is important to be able to determine how effective these
various VAWA programs are and whether the grantees are
providing adequate services for the amount of the funding they
receive.
So what specific steps has OVW taken to ensure that grant
recipients are collecting or reporting accurate and relevant
data, and what are the major challenges you see with regard to
meaningful data collection in order to determine program
effectiveness?
Ms. Carbon. Approximately 10 years ago, Congress asked us
to begin assessing our grant programs and we began a very
vigorous campaign, working with the University of Southern
Maine, to collect the kinds of data that we want. And over
time, we have continued to improve and refine how we gather
that data.
Over the course of every 6 months, we will receive, review,
and analyze over 1,000 reports from our discretionary grantees
and others. And then we funnel that information back and forth
with the program staff, with the University of Southern Maine
to make sure that we are collecting accurate data. Where we
find that the instruments are not clear, we make improvements
to that. We have worked with the field to continue refining so
that definitions are consistent, so that the reporting forms
are consistent across our programs so that we are gathering
that data. But each report is distinct to the program so that
we can gather specific information that tells us whether----
Mrs. Adams. So you are able to determine.
Ms. Carbon. Absolutely, distinguishing one from another.
Mrs. Adams. Explain OVW's relationship with the Muskie
School of Public Service at the University of Southern Maine.
What has OVW asked the Muskie School to do? How much has OVW
paid the Muskie School for their services? And is the
relationship still ongoing? What is the Muskie School still
doing for OVW?
Ms. Carbon. Yes. And what I was alluding to there with the
University of Southern Maine is the Muskie School of Public
Policy at the University of Southern Maine. We entered into an
arrangement with them, as I say, in about 2002, if I am not
mistaken, although they had done some work for us for a couple
years earlier but under a different framework. And with that,
we have paid, over the course of, I believe since 2001--it may
be a little bit earlier--approximately $17 million to review
our 21 different grant programs. And of course, those programs
have increased over time. It wasn't 21 at the beginning. That
collectively comprises about half a percent of all of our grant
funds, which is very minimal. Congress has allowed us to spend
up to 3 percent on assessment of that.
So we gather this information----
Mrs. Adams. So it is still ongoing?
Ms. Carbon. It is still ongoing, yes.
Mrs. Adams. I have one other quick question I want to ask,
and that is on STOP grants, which are OVW's single largest
grant program. It is a formula-based program to fund State and
local law enforcement, prosecution, and victim services. All or
almost all of these functions are also funded by the
Department's Byrne grant, you know, the Byrne/JAG program. You
know that program. Right?
Ms. Carbon. Yes.
Mrs. Adams. And the Byrne grant is also another formula-
based source of funding for the State and local governments.
So how does the STOP funding differ from the Byrne grant
funding, and is it necessary to have two such overlapping
programs?
Ms. Carbon. The STOP grant is distinguishable in its
coordinated community response to ending sexual assault,
domestic violence, dating violence, and stalking. And we do
this through the implementation of--a portion of the funding
goes to each different group, for example, a portion to
prosecution, law enforcement, advocacy, courts, and then there
is another fungible area that could go to anybody. We do this
through the coordination of those services and ensuring that
all of these four groups respond to the community-based needs
that are determined. And it is up to the STOP administrators,
working with their implementation team, to determine where the
needs are, where the greatest victim service needs are, where
the greatest offender accountability areas are, and working to
do so.
Mr. Sensenbrenner. The time of the gentlewoman has expired.
The gentleman from South Carolina, Mr. Gowdy.
Mr. Gowdy. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Nell Lindsey was a nurse at a local hospital in
Spartanburg. Her shift had ended and she walked to her car to
go home, but the car wouldn't start because her estranged
husband had put sugar in the gas tank. She called a friend to
come get her. She was headed home when they saw an ominous
sight, which was her husband following them in his car. And he
had been ordered to stay away from her because he had broken
her jaw on a family vacation. He had assaulted her in an
Appleby's parking lot, and a judge had ordered him to stay away
from her. But he didn't. He followed her.
And Nell and her friend Celeste did a very smart thing, Mr.
Chairman. They headed straight for the Inman Police Department.
They were running red lights, running stop signs, jumping over
railroad tracks. And Nell got out her cell phone and called
911, and they pulled into the back parking lot of the Inman
Police Station. And just as Nell was getting out with a cell
phone in her hand, her husband, Marion Lindsey, pulled up and
shot her in the head four times with two children in the back
seat.
Marion Lindsey killed Nell Lindsey. But in a very real
sense, the entire system failed her, from orders of protection
that are meaningless and can't stop bullets to women being
asked in South Carolina to go represent themselves in domestic
violence court, to inadequate training.
So Lynn Hawkins, through grants, Mr. Chairman--through
grants--transformed our approach to violence against women,
training law enforcement, training prosecutors, training
magistrate judges, training pastors to view domestic violence
as a crime and not a family matter. In 2008, we had zero
domestic-related homicides in Spartanburg County. In 2011, we
had one. So we went from leading the Nation in men killing
women to actually doing a pretty good job.
And, Mr. Chairman, I have got to give credit for that to
Lynn Hawkins and the approach that she took through these
grants, not embarrassing prosecutors and cops, but training
them and training pastors, and putting together a CDV board
with the community involved. And we are making tremendous
progress in South Carolina. This stain on the collective soul
of our State is slowly being lifted.
But there are scores of other stories just like Nell
Lindsey's. There is Liz Chesterman and there is Tamika Huston.
I have got all these names running through my head of women who
were killed by men in Spartanburg and Cherokee Counties. And we
are making progress.
And I want to say this with respect to Lynn and the
oversight of this grant program, because I sat through some of
the review sessions, the oversight is in place, at least in
Spartanburg, and the results are in place. So that is a former
life for me, and I don't get to talk to those people anymore.
But if you have a chance to talk to the people in South
Carolina, and Spartanburg in particular, my sheriff Chuck
Wright; my chief of police, Tony Fisher; Lynn Hawkins; Barry
Barnett, the prosecutor; Rusty Clevenger, the coroner, tell
them thank you for taking us from first in the Nation for men
killing women to having years where we have zero domestic-
related homicides.
I yield back.
Mr. Sensenbrenner. That is a very appropriate note to close
this hearing on. I thank the gentleman from South Carolina for
sharing this information with us. This shows that the programs
work. We need to have them work better. We need to have them
touch more people. We need to do better training.
And if there are no further questions, without objection,
the hearing is adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 11:04 a.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.]