Program areas at Friends Against Abuse
The majority of work done by Friends Against Abuse is advocacy - crime victim advocacy. In 2023 there were five advocates covering koochiching and lake of the woods counties. They provide guidance, resources and support to victims. The advocates assist victims with filing court documents. The advocates attend court on behalf of their clients. The work of Friends Against Abuse is centered around the crime victim advocate and their work. The crime victim advocates account for the greatest expense and they have the greatest impact on the clients that we serve. In 2023, wages and benefits for the crime victim advocates was $146,290.95.
The crime victim advocates provide support, guidance and resources to victims of crime. We call that direct client services. Direct client services includes safe housing, rent, storage unit rental, phone, phone replacement, cellular minutes, gas cards, food cards, local bus tickets, lock re-key/lock replacement, motion lights, ring camera or a bus ticket to st. Cloud. In 2023, Friends Against Abuse provided $13, 053.12 in direct client services to victims in koochiching and lake of the woods counties.
The direct client services for Friends Against Abuse consists of legal advocacy, safe housing, rent support, motion lights, lock replacement, storage unit rental, car repair, transportation, and utilities. The victims that we serve fall under three areas: domestic violence, sexual assault, and general crime. This includes wages and benefits for crime victim advocates. In 2023, we served 261 victims of crime. Of those, 120 were victims of domestic violence, 39 of them were victims of sexual assault (33 were children) and 95 victims of general crime.
The 24/7 crisis line is answered by phone advocates who answer calls outside of the business day. In 2023 they answered 95 calls. Normally, the number of calls into the crisis line range from 170 to 270 calls per year. The phone advocates receive a small stipend which is less than federal minimum wage, so this program is funded through a grant from the united way of northeastern Minnesota and donations from lake of the woods county and the city of international falls.