The U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of Justice Programs on Wednesday announced more than $90 million in funding to combat human trafficking, provide services to human trafficking victims and support research and evaluation on responses to human trafficking.
“Human trafficking is a global problem that affects communities throughout our country, causing immeasurable trauma to victims and their loved ones,” said OJP Deputy Assistant Attorney General Maureen A. Henneberg. “The Office of Justice Programs is committed to supporting state and local efforts to combat human trafficking operations, remove victims from harm and help survivors access the services they need to begin the journey to healing and recovery.”
Programs supported by OJP’s Office for Victims of Crime are a centerpiece of the Justice Department’s work to tackle the challenges posed by human trafficking. OVC manages the largest amount of federal funding dedicated to addressing the needs of victims of human trafficking and supporting multidisciplinary responses to this crime in the U.S., supporting more than 500 awards to organizations serving thousands of clients every year. Informed by the voices of survivors, OVC strengthens the victim service response to human trafficking through grant funding, training and technical assistance and leadership in the field.
“Survivors of human trafficking deserve easy access to the full-range of trauma-informed and victim-centered services,” said OVC Director Kristina Rose. “The Office for Victims of Crime is committed to meeting the immediate and long-term needs of survivors and ensuring that service providers have all the tools at their disposal to meet victims of human trafficking wherever they are on their healing journey.”
OVC is awarding more than $90 million in grants to empower communities to respond to human trafficking and offer essential services to survivors of human trafficking to aid them in their recovery. OJP’s National Institute of Justice (NIJ) will also continue to build knowledge of what works to combat human trafficking and serve trafficking victims. NIJ grants will support a multi-site evaluation of the Enhanced Collaborative Model to combat human trafficking and study the replication potential of a screening tool designed to help first responders identify human trafficking survivors.
The funded programs and their amounts are listed below:
• OVC is awarding more than $32.6 million under the Services for Victims of Human Trafficking program to develop, expand or strengthen victim service programs for victims of human trafficking.
• OVC is awarding nearly $16.4 million under the Housing Assistance Grants for Victims of Human Trafficking program to support housing assistance for victims of all forms of human trafficking throughout the United States.
• OVC is awarding $21.6 million under the Enhanced Collaborative Model Task Force to Combat Human Trafficking program to develop, expand or strengthen multidisciplinary task forces to fight human trafficking. Task forces include victim and social service providers, law enforcement and prosecution personnel, survivors and a range of governmental and non-governmental partners that work together to identify trafficking victims, connect them to services and bring traffickers to justice.
• OVC is awarding $3.1 million under the Human Trafficking Training and Technical Assistance Program to assist OVC Human Trafficking Grant Program grantees and other antitrafficking stakeholders through the provision of training and technical assistance and the development of tools and resources. This includes the development of anti-trafficking standards of care for victim service providers in partnership with the Office on Trafficking in Persons at the Department of Health and Human Services. It also includes training and technical assistance to support grantees in developing and implementing meaningful employment and economic empowerment practices for trafficking survivors, and in engaging individuals with lived experience to enhance anti-trafficking programming.
• OVC is awarding $1.3 million under the Services to Minor Victims of Labor Trafficking program to develop, expand or strengthen victim service programs for minor victims of labor trafficking, whose victimization occurred when they were under age 18.
• OVC is awarding $6.3 million under the Field-Generated Strategies to Address the Criminalization of Minor Victims of Sex Trafficking program to end the criminalization of minor victims of sex trafficking and develop, expand or strengthen victim service programs to support victim-centered, trauma-informed, developmentally appropriate and evidence-based responses to minor victims of sex trafficking.
• OVC is awarding nearly $5.5 million under the Improving Outcomes for Child and Youth Victims of Human Trafficking program to improve outcomes for children and youth who are victims of human trafficking by integrating human trafficking policy and programming at the state or Tribal level, and enhancing coordinated, multidisciplinary and statewide approaches to serving trafficked youth.
• OVC is awarding nearly $3.5 million under the Preventing Trafficking of Girls program to develop or enhance prevention and early intervention services based on best practices to focus on the needs of girls who are at risk or are victims of sex trafficking.
• NIJ is awarding $1.6 million under its Research and Evaluation on Trafficking in Persons program, which proposes to help better understand, prevent and respond to trafficking in persons in the United States, focusing on projects with clear implications for criminal justice policy and practice in the United States.
The awards announced above are being made as part of the regular end-of-fiscal year cycle. Additional information about these and other OJP awards can be found on the OJP Grant Awards Page at www.ojp.gov/funding/fy22-ojp-grant-awards.
The Office of Justice Programs provides federal leadership, grants, training, technical assistance and other resources to improve the nation’s capacity to prevent and reduce crime, advance racial equity in the administration of justice, assist victims and strengthen the criminal and juvenile justice systems. Additional information about OJP and its components can be found at www.ojp.gov.
