What’s New, What’s Happening

The purpose of the Research and Evaluation (R&E) Initiative is to research and evaluate approaches to combatting domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, and stalking (hereafter referred to as “VAWA crimes”). By generating more knowledge about strategies for serving victims and holding offenders accountable, communities that benefit from VAWA funding will be better equipped to align their work with practices that are known to be effective, and they will be more capable of generating empirical knowledge on the efficacy of new and promising ways of doing things. The initiative is designed to support researcher-practitioner partnerships and a broad range of research and evaluation methods, including qualitative, mixed-method, quasi-experimental, and experimental designs. Because OVW has very limited funds to support research and evaluation, this initiative prioritizes topics for which a stronger evidence base would help OVW grantees use federal funds most effectively. 

With this solicitation, the Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA) seeks applications to fund a training and technical assistance provider to work in partnership with five states, local, and/or tribal criminal justice agencies or systems to address the use of fines and fees and ensure they are being imposed in a constitutional and nondiscriminatory way. The provider will work with sites to address common barriers to creating a more equitable justice system by addressing how sites use and apply fines and fees.

Through this opportunity, the Bureau of Justice Assistance seeks applications for funding two providers to address the training and technical assistance (TTA) needs of the National Sexual Assault Kit Initiative (SAKI) site-based grantees and to provide resources to current SAKI sites across the country working Jane and John Doe sexually motivated homicide cases.

This grant program supports the critical work of state and territory domestic violence and sexual assault coalitions and is a set-aside program under the OVW STOP Violence Against Women Formula Grant Program statute. These organizations play an important role in advancing the goal of ending domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, and stalking. 

OVC seeks to develop a workforce of victim service providers to serve American Indian and Alaska Native victims of crime in locations that are remote and where positions are hard to fill. This will be accomplished by engaging interested individuals, including but not limited to, college and university students, who are from, live, and/or attend school in these areas.

Successful applicants will create (or continue operating) a victim service internship program that will place individuals in victim service positions either with a Bureau of Indian Affairs or Tribally based victim service program.