February __ 2017
Senator Richard D. Roth (Chair)
Honorable Members, Senate Budget Subcommittee No. 4
State Capitol
Sacramento, CA 95814
Fax: (916) 668-7004916
Assemblymember Shirley Weber (Chair)
Honorable Members, Assembly Budget Subcommittee No. 5
State Capitol
Sacramento, CA95814
Fax: (916) 319-2199
Dear Honorable Members,
Insert Org Name is writing to urge your support of a 15 million budget proposal to ensure continuing support for specialized services for victims of modern day slavery in California. This proposal also ensures that first responders receive appropriate training on human trafficking and that technical assistance and evaluation of trafficking programs are offered on a state wide basis. Finally, the proposal also funds a first of its kind study so that California can better understand the prevalence of human trafficking and its dynamics in our state.
Insert Org Information on HT services if relevant. Insert case examples that show need for services.
According to the National Human Trafficking Resource Center (NHTRC), in 2016 the hotline received 4137 calls from California, nearly twice the number of calls from any other state. In 2016 there were 1194 victims identified by the hotline in need of services in California. Service providers in California continue to report wait lists for trafficking victim services and that law enforcement sometimes arrests survivors simply because there is no other way to secure services for trafficking victims.
With ongoing funding available, organizations will have far greater capacity to:
- Develop and implement specialized programs,
- Hire and train specialized staff, and
- Create and/or expand the number of shelter beds dedicated solely to victims of human trafficking.
Combined with existing services, this will lead to a more sustainable, long-term response to the problem of modern slavery in our state.
Additionally, this proposal will ensure that:
- California conducts the first comprehensive prevalence state study in the nation to determine how many people are currently enslaved in California.
- Evaluates newly funded human trafficking service providers and provide concrete recommendations around best practices for providing comprehensive services for this vulnerable population
- Provides ongoing resources for training to lead to early identification and prevention of human trafficking and;
- Supports resources to build a statewide technical assistance network
California must now actively build multi-disciplinary networks to provide survivors with better access to comprehensive care. While the focus on ending the sex trafficking of children in California is crucial, we must not underestimate the need to fund specialized services for women, men, and child victims of sex and labor trafficking. To ensure that trafficking survivors receive the comprehensive services they need, a continuing funding stream must be established to support specialized organizations serving survivors of human trafficking as well as additional resources for research, evaluation and training.
Partnerships with allied organizations-including runaway and homeless youth programs, domestic violence, sexual assault, rape crisis centers, and migrant farm worker and labor groups must have funding to support specialized trafficking services in their existing programs. This will ensure existing frameworks and resources are expanded and efforts are not duplicative. It is only through providing additional funding to new and existing programs that we can begin to meet the increased demand for services for victims of modern slavery.
In this difficult climate of political instability, this specialized continuous funding is needed more than ever. Resources for vulnerablepopulations are likely to be cut nationwide and with these cuts even more people will be more vulnerable to become victims of human trafficking. Please ensure that critical services and state wide resources will be available for these victims.
For these reasons we urge the committee to provide $15 million for some of the most vulnerable crime victims in California
Sincerely,