|
creating
change |
understanding
disability |
understanding
deaf culture |
addressing
accessibility |
understanding
violence |
responding
to violence |
safety alert
If you are in danger, please use a safer computer, call 911 or your local hotline or call the National Domestic Violence Hotline: 1-800-799-SAFE (7233 voice), 1-800-787-3224 (tty). There is always a computer trail, but you can click ESCAPE to leave the site quickly.
You are here: home>community profiles>
Missouri (Kansas City)
Project Name
Safety First Initiative
Partners
Metropolitan Organization to Counter Sexual Assault (MOCSA) 
(http://www.mocsa.org)
Rose Brooks Center
(http://www.rosebrooks.org)
University of Missouri-Kansas City, Institute for Human Development
(http://www.ihd.umkc.edu)
Overview
The Kansas City-based collaboration – formally named Safety First Initiative – represents a collaboration of three local experts in their respective fields. The Metropolitan Organization to Counter Sexual Assault (MOCSA) is recognized as the area's leading provider of services related to sexual assault. Rose Brooks Center is a comprehensive domestic violence agency that provides a full continuum of care including prevention programming, crisis intervention and other supportive services to thousands of women and children each year. The Institute for Human Development is an applied research and training center for human development and promotes high-quality community-based services and individual supports for people with disabilities and their families.
The Safety First Initiative seeks to enhance the capacity of victim service and disability support agencies to provide the protections and services needed by victims with disabilities within the Kansas City metropolitan area. Additionally, they work to improve the coordination of supports and services between victim service and disability service agencies that support victims with disabilities.
While the collaborative partners have had experience working together on similar issues, this project represents the first concerted effort in Kansas City to identify and correct barriers to safe and responsive services for people with disabilities who have experienced stalking, sexual assault, or domestic violence. Each of the three partner organizations has committed to examining their policies and procedures, physical space, and agency culture and making changes where necessary. They have pulled together an advisory committee comprised of stakeholders in their community to provide them with guidance through their needs assessment and change process.
The Safety First Initiative will focus their efforts on improving the accessibility of their core collaborative partners, using the lessons learned from their journey to inform the greater metropolitan area. Ultimately, the Safety First Initiative wants to build a bridge between victim service agencies and disability service providers, increasing community capacity to serve women with disabilities who are victims and survivors of violence.
The vision for the Safety First Initiative is to change the mindset in the Kansas City metropolitan area resulting in a sustained collaborative response that provides culturally competent, respectful, accessible, empowerment based services to women with disabilities who are victims and survivors of violence.
Contact Information
Metropolitan Organization to Counter Sexual Assault
Charity Hope
816-931-4527 (v)
1-800-735-2966 (MO Relay)
