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R.I. groups to
benefit from 'Safe Start'
violence grant
(November
2005 Issue)
By Jennifer Chase Esposito
Family Service of Rhode Island, a non-profit human service agency
that provides mental health care for infants, toddlers, school-aged
children and their families, was the lead agency to be awarded a
two-year, $420,000 grant in September that is designed to protect
Rhode Island's youngest victims of violence.
Called "Providence Safe Start," the grant will address the after-effects
on children ages six and under who have witnessed violence both
in the home and in the community.
"Children can be harmed just as significantly by witnessing violence
as by being a direct victim of violence," says Fruma Efreom, MPA,
director of communications at Family Service of R.I. and the grant
writer for the Providence Safe Start grant. "The program that we
develop here in Providence will be part of a national evaluation
study sponsored by the U.S. Office of Justice and will help establish
best practice standards for helping children affected by violence."
Family Service or Rhode Island is headed by CEO Margaret Holland
McDuff, who has both an MBA and MA in psychology. Susan Erstling,
Ph.D. is vice president of intake, trauma and emergency services
and the overall supervisor of the Providence Safe Start Program.
According to Efreom, the $420,000 will be stretched far: it will
help support staff at three of five partner agencies in R.I.; a
Spanish bilingual advocate will be hired by the R.I. Coalition Against
Domestic Violence to work out of Providence's two women's domestic
violence shelters; and the Family Court of R.I. will also be able
to hire an advocate who will identify and track cases coming to
the court in which children are exposed to violence.
Additionally, it will support clinical treatment for a child exposed
to violence, and his or her parents, at the Family Service Trauma
and Loss Center. The center, along with the Providence Police Department
and the R.I. Department of Children, Youth and Families, are partners
with Family Service of R.I. in the Providence Safe Start program,
which has become what Efreom calls a "de-facto test site for a briefer
modification of the Alicia Lieberman child-parent model."
The money from the grant will help all partners continue their
collaboration, something that is unusual in an age of more budget
cuts than granted grants. "Many times, agencies want to work closely
with each other," says Efreom. "But collaboration requires staff
time and they do not [always] have funds to support that staff time...[The
grant] provides funding to support our collaboration."
Getting the grant was a real coup for R.I. and for Providence.
At least two other collaborations applied for it in the state and
Efreom says at least 200 applications were filed nationwide. But
this grant is not Providence's first venture into providing services
for children who have witnessed violence. Providence is one of only
12 Child Development/Community Policing Program replication sites
in the country. Providence Safe Start was first developed with help
from Providence Chief of Police Dean Esserman, who assisted the
Yale Child Study Center in Conn. when he was deputy chief there.
When he went to Rhode Island, he asked Family Service of R.I. to
partner with him in implementing it in the state.
"With generous local support from the Rhode Island Foundation and
the R.I. Justice Commission, we were able to train jointly with
the Providence police at Yale and field the 'Police Go Team,'" says
Efreom. The Go Team is a group of clinicians and bilingual case
managers who respond on-site to calls from police, every hour of
every day, by providing crisis intervention, stabilization and immediate
follow-up to children who have witnessed or been victims of violence
and their families.
Providence's attempt at expanding the Providence Safe Start program,
now, is coming at a good time for the city: In 2003, there were
1,697 police reports of domestic violence, of which 586 cited children
were present. Efreom notes that although overall crime in Providence
has dropped in the last few years, domestic violence reports have
risen, though it's impossible to know whether the actual number
of cases has risen or whether the public is now more willing to
report domestic violence as a result of community policing, and
the ongoing media campaign sponsored by the R.I. Coalition Against
Domestic Violence.
"This grant isn't the end, the ultimate goal," says Efreom. "It
is another step, albeit an extremely important step, in a process.
We have been building this program in Providence for several years
and we have more plans for the future."
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