Department of Sexual Prevention of Violence, HHS Mut, which leaves local efforts: NPR

April 1 was the first day of consciousness for sexual assault. It is also the day on which the Ministry of Health and Human Services released the teams who work on the prevention of sexual violence.

The layoffs were part of a round of Dramatic cuts To the federal health agencies in the middle of the Trump administration and Elon Musk’s To shrink efforts The federal employee.

According to several sources, most of the employees of preventing violence were released, including the current and former employees. The department is part of the Injury Center in the centers for the control and prevention of diseases. At the same time the leader of another HHS agency who works on domestic violence Office for prevention and services for family violence and serviceswas put in administrative leave.

The congress has prescribed the work of these agencies, including the support of state and local programs for sexual assault across the country. These laws, including the law on violence against women, had Non -partisan support.

The time of the layoffs was “a combination of heartbreaking and insulting,” says Matthew Huffman der Missouri coalition against domestic and sexual violenceA membership association of domestic violence and rape crisis centers across the state.

He says that the current situation for local groups is confusing and stressful that rely on federal funds for their work. Without the federal employee to manage and support them, “it leaves a large gap in our ability to be really effective.”

“Even in a red state, we have never had any problems going through our work,” says a health officer in the middle west who has not agreed not to call itself because she fears for retaliation for the conversation with the media. “It’s not a super controversy – you don’t want your daughter to be raped in college, right?”

In response to the question of NPR, how sexual violence prevention funds are distributed after these teams have been shortened, the HHS spokesman Emily Hilliard wrote: “All legally prescribed positions and offices remain intact and are better positioned as a result of the restructuring in order to carry out the legal intention of the congress.”

Decades of experience “wiped out”

One of the dismissed CDC employees estimates that two thirds of the department employees were released last week, about 100 people, based on crowdsourced documents and their knowledge of the HR department. NPR agreed not to name her because she fears that she is talking to the media.

The department is working on prevention strategies for sexual assault, child abuse and gun violence. Research and programming staff in all of these areas have been shortened.

The CDC employee says that she was supported in the past, she was not surprised that the programs were shortened to sexual violence.

“We had an idea,” she says. “Much of our work examines gender -specific violence and gender Main goal In the second Trump government.

As an example of his work, CDC contributed to financing and evaluating them Mapping of “Hot Spots” Where the students feel uncertain and susceptible to sexual assault so that schools can intervene. In ColoradoHotspot cards lead to some schools to add lights and cameras in certain locations and to lay changing rooms.

CDC can guide Community partners in their programs and help them evaluate the effects. “We have the ability we have the infrastructure, we have the know -how to find out what works to prevent sexual violence,” says the CDC employee.

Another released CDC employee said that she was surprised that some parts of the Department of Violence Prevention are preserved, including the surveillance branch. This made the cuts for her team, which felt more targeted.

“I find [it] Tell a story about what was important for what they think was important, “says NPR.

She says she and her colleagues feel “disappointed” by the cuts. “We all only stagger and try to find out what we do next,” she says. “This was not just a job for us, it was something that we were all passionate about.”

Without the federal government that supports these efforts across the country, state and local groups are alone, says Lynn Rosenthal. She was HHS director of sexual and gender-specific violence under the bidding administration and also worked as a lawyer of the National Network for Domestic Violence and as director of a local rape crisis center.

“For decades – in the truest sense of the word – the distribution of violence prevention will be lost in this way,” says Rosenthal. She explains that the reason why there is a federal role in preventing and intervention in domestic violence and sexual assault is that states needed help in financing and program design and evaluation and asked for federal measures.

The CDC teams that have been cut helped local groups “to learn, what works and what does not work – what should we try?” she says. “They are very generous to convene people across the country to try to learn from their experiences.” The fact that they were fired adds is “a big loss”.

Local groups nervous about federal funds

The congress recently acquired 210 million US dollars for local grants over five years for the rape and educational program at CDC. However, since the employees who distributed the funds and advised on the projects have been released, the money can be difficult to access.

In state health departments “we are in a holding pattern because you have not yet finished the money, but if there is no one to distribute the funds, we are not sure whether we have the money to actually pay for our employees [or] If we are able to deduct our means, “says the health officer in the middle west.

This financing was already interrupted In the first weeks of the Trump administration, when the White House held all budget spending and caused some accommodations in Texas to take the staff.

Huffman from the Missouri Coalition against domestic and sexual violence says that the current situation for local groups is confusing and stressful. “Here in Missouri, many of our agencies for domestic violence rely on this financing from one half to a third of their entire operating budget,” he says.

A group of congress democrats sent a letter To Health Minister Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on Friday, to put it worried about these cuts. “We ask you to immediately cancel the reduction in strength for these important initiatives and to explain how you make sure that these programs continue to work effectively,” they wrote.

Several Republican legislators who have sponsored related laws in the past did not answer the request from NPR for comments on the cuts.

One of the dismissed CDC employees fears that the financing may not come out of the door due to paperwork problems. “I don’t know what it will look like,” she says. “However, what I know is that the field is very strong. We consist of lawyers – that is the heart of who we are – and I assume that there will be some barnstorming.”

Do you have any information that you want to communicate about the layoffs and the restructuring in the federal health agencies? Achieve via encrypted communication: Selena Simmons-Duffin @Selena.02