When survivors with disabilities and Deaf survivors engage with your victim service organization or disability program, they are necessarily engaging with the policies that guide the delivery of your services. Regardless of they type of organization, failure to account for the lived experiences of survivors with disabilities in your organizational polices results in delays in service provision, confusion among staff about what is allowed, safety concerns among survivors, the provision of inadequate or unsafe services, or the denial of services completely.
Both victim service and disability organizations have policies in place that can impact survivors with disabilities. However, implications for organizational policies differ since victim service organizations primarily need to enhance their policies to account for accessibility and disability organizations need to enhance their policies to account for safety. To adequately address policies at both victim service organizations and disability organizations, Centering Survivors with Disabilities in Your Organizational Policies is being held over two separate webinars. The first, being held on August 23rd focuses on polices at victim service organizations. The second will focus on policies at disability organization and will be held on August 30th.

Victim Service Organizations
Are you prepared to allow a survivor with a disability have a paid personal care attendant provide services in your shelter? Have you considered how to address the tension between the need to have a service animal in shelter and other residents' fear or allergies? Is your organization prepared to serve an adult survivor that has a guardian?

Disability Organizations
Are you prepared to address the safety needs of a survivor whose personal care worker or staff member is the one hurting them? What about when the survivor and the person who has hurt them are both receiving services from your organization? Do your mandatory reporting policies create a barrier to survivors reaching out to you for help?

This webinar will examine key policies that victim service organizations should have in place to account for unique circumstances in the lives of survivors with disabilities, including personal care attendants, service animals and guardianship.

Learn more about the webinar on August 30th