AACs White Paper Outlines Need for Funding for Disability-Led Victim Service Agencies

September 16, 2022 / Victim Services

A woman with developmental disabilities sits in her power wheelchair, smiling and gesturing. She has a stylish short hair cut and wears an orange shirt to match her red hair.

A new white paper from the Adult Advocacy Centers discusses the need for a more inclusive and representative funding model that includes disability-led victim services organizations and supports all types of victims with disabilities.

People with disabilities are nearly four times more likely to be victims of crime than people without disabilities. Unfortunately, this statistic has not improved in the decades since the government began collecting and tracking the data, and yet the same crime victim service organizations receive grant money annually from large government funds, regardless of their successes or failures. Meanwhile, organizations that specifically serve crime victims with disabilities apply for this funding but are rarely chosen.

At the same time, government disability funds and crime victim services typically support individuals with only one type of disability—developmental disabilities or mental illness, for example. However, individuals often have more than one disability, and this can make it very difficult for those individuals to get support and for organizations that wish to serve people in these intersectionalities to get funding. In addition, money is often siloed to crime victim service organizations that fail to include individuals with disabilities in leadership positions. When funded organizations lack representation from the disability community, the community’s voice goes unheard.

If we, as a society, want to improve the victimization rate for people with disabilities, we must improve the systems that serve them. Our new white paper outlines this position.

Read the White Paper

The Need for Funding for Disability-Led Victim Service Organizations