The U.S. Department of Justice’s Office on Violence Against Women webpage provides resources for strengthening services to individuals encountering domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, and stalking. Included is background information on different types of violence and national hotline numbers to address them, as well as a directory with contact information for domestic violence prevention networks and coalitions for all 50 states, the District of Columbia, American Samoa, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands.

(See also Resources on "intimate violence" in the Resource Library)

This web conference was hosted by PreventConnect, a national project of the California Coalition Against Sexual Assault (CALCASA) in collaboration with the National Resource Center on Domestic Violence. The web conference discussed strengthening economic supports and security for women and families to prevent sexual and intimate partner violence, as well as adverse effects resulting from this violence. The presenters explained the connection between strengthening economic supports and preventing multiple forms of violence and highlighted the importance of explaining this connection to stakeholders.

This article published in the New England Journal of Medicine discusses how the stay-at-home orders placed during the COVID-19 pandemic trapped victims with their abusers, which caused advocates to become concerned about a potential increase in intimate partner violence (IPV). The article notes how victims not being able to safely connect to services has led to a decrease in calls to domestic violence hotlines, as opposed to an anticipated increase. The article also discusses barriers to reporting IPV during the pandemic, and steps that can be taken to facilitate more equitable access to services as the pandemic continues.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, Division of Violence Prevention published a technical package based on evidence-based strategies and approaches to help communities and states focus on prevention activities and provide victim-centered services to survivors and their families. The package features a multi-level, multi-sector approach to supporting survivors, which incorporates social services, justice, housing, advocates, community organizations, and the health care sector working collaboratively to support children, youth, and families. Teaching healthy relationship skills and effective parenting, strengthening economic supports for families, creating protective environments, and civil legal protections are prevention strategies addressed in this technical package.

The National Indigenous Women's Resource Center will host this webinar on October 21, 2020 from 3:00 p.m. to 4:30 p.m. ET. The webinar will feature a discussion of the causes of domestic violence in Indigenous communities. The goal of the webinar is to explain the dynamics of intimate partner violence (IPV) from a survivor's perspective and to highlight the importance of cultural practices in building capacity to provide respectful and effective advocacy with those surviving IPV and other types of domestic violence.

This report is part of the Responding to Intimate Violence in Relationship Programs (RIViR) study to evaluate approaches for assessing teen dating violence. The report covers how to accurately identify youth in Healthy Marriage and Relationship Education (HMRE) programs who are experiencing teen dating violence (TDV) so they can be referred for additional services. The report also examines how youth and TDV program staff perceive tools to assess TDV and strategies to implement these tools. The report compared two HMRE programs—More Than Conquerors, Inc. of Conyers, Georgia and Youth and Family Services of Rapid City, South Dakota.

This blogpost illustrates some of the programs at the Family and Youth Services Bureau (FYSB) in the Administration on Children, Youth, and Families (ACYF) which are designed to reduce youth homelessness, domestic violence, and adolescent pregnancy. The blogpost identifies one approach for self-sufficiency and health among FYSB-funded grantees that is called the success sequence – first graduate from high school, then get a full-time job, and then get married before having children – which, if followed in that order, is likely to enable young people to avoid poverty and to achieve economic stability.

This blogpost identifies how closures and other COVID-19 safety measures pose challenges for victims of domestic violence. The blogpost notes how the Family Violence Prevention and Services (FVPSA) program under the Family and Youth Services Bureau (FYSB) administers funding to support emergency shelters and services for domestic violence survivors. The blogpost also suggests how responding to domestic violence can be part of a community’s disaster and emergency preparedness plans, requiring advance training, partnership building with local domestic violence service providers and state domestic violence coalitions, reviewing plans at the beginning of an emergency to identify effective implementation, and continuous updating of resources as new information emerges. The blogpost also highlights the phone number of the National Domestic Violence Hotline (open 24/7/365) and the availability of online chat services for the hotline.

This referral guide helps fatherhood practitioners better understand what types of referrals are appropriate for individuals who have survived domestic violence. The brief also includes information on anger management programs, battering intervention programs, and domestic violence agencies. This guide was created through the Preventing and Addressing Intimate Violence when Engaging Dads (PAIVED) study, which was funded by the Office of Family Assistance and overseen by the Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation.

This issue brief identifies the correlation of racial trauma and trauma caused in family violence. The brief covers issues of structurally embedded inequalities, how individual actions cause racial trauma, and racial trauma’s impact on communities of color. Beyond the research, the brief features approaches taken in Virginia that individuals, communities, organizations, and service professionals could adopt to prevent and mitigate race-based traumatic stress.