View Agenda Item

Consent 1.I.

Regular City Council Meeting

Meeting Date:: 10/11/2011
TITLE: Approval of Domestic Violence Unit & Victim Witness Assistance Sub-Grants
PRESENTED BY:: Brent Brooks
Department:: Legal

Presentation:

Information

PROBLEM/ISSUE STATEMENT

Since July 2000, the City Attorney's Office has annually applied for and been awarded federal Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) monies through the Montana Board of Crime Control in the form of sub-grants. These sub-grants help fund positions within the City Attorney's Office Domestic Violence Unit and Victim Witness Assistance Program, which together provide statutorily-mandated services to victims of violent crime including domestic violence, sexual assault, stalking, assault and violations of protective orders. The project titles for these sub-grants are the “Victim Witness Assistance Program” (Victim Witness grant) and the “Domestic Violence Unit” (DV Unit grant). The Victim Witness grant partially funds the office’s victim/witness program director and a part-time secretary, while the DV Unit grant partially funds a dedicated domestic violence prosecutor. Together, these employees provide specialized prosecutorial services and statutorily-mandated victim services (as well as a wide variety of additional services) concerning crimes of domestic violence, sexual assault, stalking, order-of-protection violations, and assault.

ALTERNATIVES ANALYZED

The Council may:

Accept the grants, continuing the federal and state-supported funding of these positions; or
Decline the grants, which would require the General Fund to provide all the funds for these state-mandated services.

FINANCIAL IMPACT

The sub-grant awards are conditioned upon the City funding at least 25% of the projects’ budgets in the form of local match. Historically, the City has paid the costs that are above and beyond the sub-grant awards and that exceeds the match requirement.

The MBCC expects the City to take on more financial responsibility for these projects each year. As such, the MBCC has awarded $15,746.00 less in FY12 than what the City requested for these two grants.

The total amount of the sub-grant awards from the Board of Crime Control for FY 2012 are:

$30,126.00 (partial funding for the Victim Witness Assistance Program Director Grant); and

$41,606.00 (partial funding for the Domestic Violence Dedicated Prosecutor Grant).

Without this grant funding, the City would have the burden of fully funding these important positions in order to maintain the staff and materials necessary to fulfill statutorily-mandated services to victims of violent crime under MCA sections 46-24-101 through 46-24-212 (2011).

Each year the Montana Department of Justice, Board of Crime Control grant amounts have been estimated into the fiscal year budget. The City's match for the Victim Witness Assistance Program grant totals $50,512.00 which is a hard match (money). For the Domestic Violence Unit grant the City's match will be at least $54,325 to fund salary and benefits.

RECOMMENDATION

Staff recommends that the Mayor and City Council approve and accept the Domestic Violence Unit and Victim Witness Assistance Program grants as awarded by the Montana Department of Justice and the Board of Crime Control.

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