Victim services at risk of cuts as federal funding streams run dry

Connecticut nonprofits that work with survivors of crime are bracing for programming cuts as sources of federal dollars that support their work recede.  

Dozens of organizations that work with survivors of domestic violence, child abuse, sexual violence and human trafficking are supported financially through the Crime Victims Fund, a federal program that collects and redistributes penalties and fines from federal criminal convictions.

In recent years, as the balance in that fund has declined, Connecticut supplemented its share with federal COVID-19 relief money. Now those funds are about to run out. 

The amount of money in the Crime Victims Fund — established under the federal Victim of Crimes Act, or VOCA — has steadily declined in recent years, from a peak of $13.1 billion in 2017 to $3.3 billion in 2024. And ongoing lawsuits against two defendants over large penalties has put 60% of the fund’s balance in limbo, according to an October memo from the Connecticut Judicial Branch’s Office of Victim Services, which distributes the federal grant.

Marc Pelka, deputy director of the office, told the Connecticut Mirror in an email that Connecticut’s share of that grant has dropped from $24 million to $9 million in the last five years.

In order to maintain funding at the necessary level, the state legislature allocated $48 million in federal coronavirus relief money to bolster the Crime Victims Fund from 2023 through 2025. But as of next year, when the emergency relief runs out, the amount of available funding for victim service providers in Connecticut is expected to drop by 29%, Pelka said.

Nonprofits who work with victims are already gearing up for the change. 

Gary Steck, the CEO of Wellmore Behavioral Health, which provides mental health services for children and substance abuse programs for adults, told CT Mirror in an email that they currently receive $235,000 from the Office of Victim Services. He said they expect a reduction of 14% in their grant for next year, meaning they will have to reduce the number of children they can serve annually from 400 to 345.

“That’s [a] big hit at once when you consider these are traumatized kids, but it may be worse,” he said. Most of the funding, he said, goes toward treatment for children and teens who are crime victims, and their families.

Josiah Brown, the executive director of Connecticut CASA, told CT Mirror that the agency learned the maximum grant it would receive would be the same annual amount it’s gotten for the past three years: about $142,000. The problem with that, Brown said, is that CASA’s program has grown significantly since 2022. 

CASA, which stands for Court Appointed Special Advocates, assigns volunteers to visiting a single child or set of siblings on a monthly basis for at least a year and a half. The purpose is to provide a consistent adult advocate for children who have experienced abuse and neglect, in a system where the social workers and attorneys assigned to these children are under large caseloads. 

Brown said the first year CASA received VOCA funds, it had three staff members and worked in two courts — Waterbury and New Haven. Since then, it has expanded to five full-time staff and one part-time staff member who work in seven courts around the state. Brown said the organization asked the state for $250,000 this year, but he said it has not yet been included in the state budget. 

“We are serving a growing number of children who have high needs, Brown said. “And while it’s meant to be a public-private partnership with some of our funds coming from foundation grants and private donations and event sponsorships, to expect, over the long term, for the majority of such funds to come from private sources would be an excessive expectation.”

Beth Hamilton of the CT Alliance to End Sexual Violence said her organization receives $5.1 million in VOCA funds each year. That money goes toward the alliance’s nine community-based sexual assault crisis programs, running the agency’s 24/7 hotline, and providing a variety of services, including one-on-one counseling, survivor support groups, assistance with housing and food insecurity and a legal representation team.

Hamilton said she doesn’t yet know if or by how much the alliance’s funding will be cut. She said that Governor Ned Lamont had allocated $1.25 million in his budget proposal for the alliance and she hoped it would be enough to make up for any federal funding the organization might lose. 

For Hamilton, deeper cuts to funding could mean the organization would not be able to continue operating their hotline 24/7, or have enough people to accompany every survivor who goes to the emergency room for a forensic evidence collection.

She said her organization, which serves between 7,500 and 8,000 people annually, helps mainly low-income people who don’t have a lot of other ways to access services. “My real fear is, the more that word might get out about changing services, the less survivors think that they have outlets to reach out to and get support,” Hamilton said. 

Meghan Scanlon of the Connecticut Coalition Against Domestic Violence said her organization was already making plans in anticipation of changes to VOCA funding. CCADV received $8.5 million through VOCA in FY2025 and she expects it will lose about a third of that.

The organization asked the state of Connecticut to allocate $1 million to keep its domestic violence hotline going. Scanlon said they received about 25,000 calls to their hotline last year. 

The remainder of the federal funds that the organization receives go to 18 local domestic violence agencies across the state, where Scanlon said they cover costs of staff who help victims with safety planning and obtaining housing and other services, as well as those who support victims during court proceedings. 

CCADV has asked those 18 organizations each to reduce their budgets by 30% in anticipation of the cuts. 

BHcare, one of the organizations CCADV funds, has been working to reduce its budget by 30%, said Emily Granelli, the organization’s chief business development officer.

That hasn’t been easy, Granelli said. “?The only way we can continue to serve the population that we serve, which is over 6,000 victims and children every year, is to provide them less services,” she said.

Granelli said ultimately the budget cuts affected the entire support system for victims.  

“?If we’re all short-staffed, we’re all funded by the same funding stream, [incoming phone calls] will just keep rolling around,” she explained. “?So there are people that won’t be able to get the help that they need when they need it, and in domestic violence situations, in the worst case scenario, people could lose their lives.”