The Office of Victim Services Offers Hope and Assistance for Victims of Violent Crimes

April is Sexual Assault Awareness Month and it’s also Sexual Assault Awareness Month Day of Action on April 2nd; it is also National Crime Victims' Rights Week April 6-12.

In this episode of The Paid Leave Podcast I speak with Rachel McKnight, Program Manager from the Office of Victim Services (OVS), and Marc Pelka, Deputy Director. They explain how OVS assists crime victims with financial expenses, receiving around 2,000 applications annually. They detail the types of crimes, including violent and property crimes, vehicular crimes, and the various expenses covered by OVS, such as medical bills, funeral costs, and lost wages. They also discuss the collaboration and the change of law that allows OVS and CT Paid Leave to work together. With the two agencies working together, it offers income replacement and support for victims of violent crimes and their families, emphasizing the importance of financial aid in the aftermath of crime.

To get in touch with OVS please go to their website at: jud.ct.gov/crimevictim.

or email them at: OVScompensation@jud.ct.gov.

or call OVS at: 888-286-7347.

 For more information or to apply for benefits please go to: ctpaidleave.org

https://ctpaidleave.org/s/?language=en_US



https://www.facebook.com/CTPaidLeave



https://www.instagram.com/ctpaidleave/



https://twitter.com/CTPaidLeave



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Transcript

Nancy Barrow: 0:01

Hello Connecticut, and welcome to The Paid Leave Podcast. The title basically says it all. I'm Nancy Barrow, and I will be delving into this new state program and how it can help you and your family. This podcast will give you information you should know about Connecticut Paid Leave and maybe just a little bit more. Connecticut Paid Leave brings peace of mind to your home, family and workplace. Welcome to The Paid Leave Podcast. April is Sexual Assault Awareness Month, and it's also Sexual Assault Awareness MonthDay of Action on April 2 and National Crime Victims week begins April 6 through the 12th. And here to talk about this and many other things are Rachel McKnight, the Program Manager from the Office of Victim Services, also known as OVS, and Marc Pelka, Deputy Director from OVS Judicial Branch. And welcome to The Paid Leave Podcast to

Rachel McKnight: 0:56

Thank you for having us Nancy. both of you.

Nancy Barrow: 0:58

Why don't you tell me, Rachel, what you do as Program Manager.

Rachel McKnight: 1:00

As Nancy mentioned, program manager for the Office of Victim Services. Weassist victims of crime with certain financial expenses. We're located in one office, the claims department. We receive approximately around 2000 applications a year for assistance. The primary function of the compensation unit is to really supply and try to make certain expenses whole for crime victims or relatives of crime victims.

Nancy Barrow: 1:29

And how long have you worked at OVS?

Rachel McKnight: 1:31

I've worked at OVS for since 1998 so yeah, so I think it's 26 years now. Sorry,

Nancy Barrow: 1:40

That's when I came to Connecticut. Yeah, that's That's amazing.

Rachel McKnight: 1:44

I've met such wonderful people going through such difficult times unfortunately. It's been quite an experience, and it is an honor working in this agency.

Nancy Barrow: 1:57

Because you do such good work, it's important work, that you're helping people at a terrible time in their life. So I think it's probably difficult but really rewarding, I'm sure.

Rachel McKnight: 2:07

Perfect way to say it yes.

Nancy Barrow: 2:09

And Marc, what do you do as Deputy Director?

Marc Pelka: 2:11

I don't have the years of service that Rachel has, so I stand here in gratitude for her service to the people of the state over these years. She does a phenomenal job leading a unit of dedicated staff who every day, are answering calls, receiving visits, responding to emails from victims and survivors of crime, seeking to rebuild as best as they can and recover in the aftermath of crime. I have the privilege of supporting the work across five areas of work at Judicial Branch Office of Victim Services, we are guided by a vision for Connecticut to be a state where all victims of crime are treated with respect and fairness and receive comprehensive, coordinated and victim centered services. We put the victim's experience on an individual basis at the center of all the work that we do to make sure that we are applying advocacy services, financial assistance and information in a way that meets them where they are. There were in 2023, over 30,000 violent crimes in our state, and they varied. They included various types of assaults, including sexual assault, family violence, including murder, and every one of those crimes impacted someone and that person's family, that person's community, in very different ways. You can never predict how someone, how any of us, would respond in the aftermath of a crime. And in terms of property crimes, there was over 98,000 property crimes that occurred, and that could be damage to your home, to your car, a stolen car. That could mean property that you were, that you hold very dearly, a family heirloom that was taken from your house or in your possession. And that also could send people reeling. And there's a whole variety of physical, mental health, emotional, spiritual impacts of financial course, impacts of crime that can ripple over many, many years. So we try Judicial Branch Office of Victim Services to be within that victim's individual experience. And Rachel's program, the Victim Compensation Program has the ability to provide financial aid to help people rebuild in the aftermath of crime, with bills that may be piling up at the same time they're treating their wounds, seeking medical care, even burying a loved one, they can try to help support that aspect. Where else OVS tries to be there for victims and survivors is in the courts. There are court based victim advocates in every adult court across Connecticut, and there's a regional approach applied to the juvenile court, so victims in Connecticut, thankfully have several rights under the state constitution and the state statute, to participate in a court proceeding, to receive information, to be treated with fairness and respect, and to participate in general in the proceedings. But it can be very hard, very intimidating, to find out where your court may be, to potentially come face to face again with the person who perpetrated harm against you and their family, right?

Nancy Barrow: 5:09

And be re victimized

Marc Pelka: 5:10

Exactly the re-trauma can resurface again you it's trauma is very difficult because the brain, often to protect the body, will lock itself down and really bury the instant memories that are happening at the crime scene or at the at the incident, and that may help that person endure tremendous and harrowing incident, but unfortunately, the brain holds on to it and can release over time. So you could confront somebody in or be face to face, or pass someone in a court hallway that caused tremendous harm, and all sudden you are right back at that crime scene. So we are thankful for the victim services advocates who are there to inform what does this term mean a case disposition? What is this hearing about when, if I wish to be in the courtroom while my perpetrators cases is being raised? How? When do I get there? Where do I sit? What do I do when the advocates are there to help walk them through it, and also connect them to services many times, to the compensation program. That could be the first time that the victim will say, Gosh, by being in court here today, I'm paying for parking, I'm paying for gas, I'm taking a time away from work. I'm not being paid. But this matters, and I'm here that the victim advocate can say you may be eligible for Victim Compensation. Here's a number you can call for someone who can explain more detail about whether you may be eligible and support you. We also Nancy have staff who are administering grants, connecting the nonprofit area into this work, that there are people who do the crucial work every day of for example, a gun violence victim coming to the hospital in the immediate aftermath and helping to de escalate any potential frustration or, I guess, retaliation they may feel to the person who harmed them, but also avail them of services talking sexual assault, Domestic violence, those program providers are critical information. Getting information out there is another critical area of our work, information, and so victims can be aware of their rights services available and what they can take advantage of through that work. So OVS, every day, is trying to stand up to that very bold and aspirational vision to help serve the people in moments of tremendous need.

Nancy Barrow: 7:21

One of the things that I remember talking to you about is like the motor vehicle aspect of it too, because a lot of people don't realize that people are victims in drunk driving, or there could be accidents in that nature. I didn't realize that you covered motor vehicles as well.

Marc Pelka: 7:37

We recognize the tremendous impact that a vehicular manslaughter or an impaired driving offense can have and so there are a variety of court based advocates who can be there. I drive every day, and I need to remind myself that the vehicle I'm driving, if in collision with somebody else, could cause very serious or deadly harm. It's not the same as carrying a knife or wielding a gun, but that can lead to the death or serious harm of somebody else. It's for someone who commits impaired driving or vehicular manslaughter, it really ought not be called an accident or or a crash. It's, it's, it's an incident that has very serious consequences and creates very serious challenges and can be very hard to process as the case moves through.

Nancy Barrow: 8:23

It's unexpected too right? So those things are, well, most violent crimes are pretty unexpected, and I think it would be really difficult to deal with it as as a person in general, and then it affects the whole family as well.

Rachel McKnight: 8:36

We certainly help both personal injury and relatives of homicide when there's a drunk driving involved evading or if the charge shows intent. But in general, people find out about our program in many different ways. They'll find out the police give out a card with our information on it if they were admitted to a hospital. Hospitals, by statute, have our posters in their ER room, as well as financial counselors are aware of us. Funeral homes are aware and give out our program. As Mark mentioned, we have advocates in the court that assists victims of crime or relatives of victims of homicide, completing applications. Mark also mentioned the contractors that we may fund, the nonprofit advocates are a large part of helping people complete our applications and giving our information out. And once somebody has our information, they usually either will contact us by phone, email, and there are occasions where someone may come into our office, especially if there is an ASAP funeral need that they just left the funeral home, they gave them our information, wanted to bring the application, or needed help filling out the application.

Nancy Barrow: 9:52

And you compensate for all of those things. Yes, yes, funeral costs and yes,

Rachel McKnight: 9:56

We do have a maximum we cover out of. Look at medical bills, dental bills. Someone may need plastic surgery because of what happened to them. We cover special needs, medical equipment. People have had to modify homes or vehicles because of the injuries that they had because of the incident. Lost wages, which we could get into more that how we could have been working with Connecticut Paid Leave, travel expenses for both personal injury victims or relatives of homicide to attend court proceedings. If they're out of state, and yes, out of state, in state, we could just do mileage, as Mark mentioned, just something is small, because they don't minimize anything but parking expenses, salary loss to attend the court proceedings. Hotel stays, lodging and travel expenses, loss of support for spouses and minor children of homicide victims and crime scene cleanup and which we have seen an increase of requests. Security Systems, insecurity cameras, funeral benefit does have a maximum of 6000 and the security cameras has a maximum of $1,000 but we can assist with the security system, security cameras, security lights, someone may need.

Nancy Barrow: 11:11

Wow you've thought of everything really.

Rachel McKnight: 11:13

We try to, we do have to follow us statutes and regulations. The list is quite expansive.

Nancy Barrow: 11:18

Right? Yeah, it's amazing what you cover, you don't think of these things. when you're the victim of a crime, or a family member is a victim of a crime, right? You don't think of that. These are the things that will alleviate so much stress in someone's life, you know? And I'm sure that that's what you hear.

Rachel McKnight: 11:35

Right? And that's a great point, and that's why the Office of Victim Services encourages people, even if you do not have expenses file with our office, you don't have to have expenses. We could. If we find the claim eligible, we'll send you a letter that the claims determined eligible. If you have future Mental Health, Counseling expenses, salary loss, so people do not realize sometimes the amount of expenses we cover until they apply with our office.

Nancy Barrow: 11:59

You're the best kept secret. It was interesting. Like, how do people find you? And it's through the courts, and it's through police, and it's through organizations, maybe like MADD or things, things of that nature. So it's you've really had to work pretty hard to have these connections. Do you educate people, or how do you let them know? And because it's so vast. Like, that's what I was saying when I first met you. I was like, Wow, you guys do so much at Office of Victim Services.

Rachel McKnight: 12:26

Absolutely. And as I mentioned, the referral sources are the people that refer us. We really rely on our business partners and our advocates in the court and the advocates, because the compensation is a department of six claims examiners, where their function is primarily processing the claim as quick as they can. And we are a state that we do not require a victim to supply us with medical reports, the police information, salary information, we have received the application, even if it's not complete, as long as it's signed and has Crime Information. We'll take that and the claims examiners do the majority of the work, the requesting information needed so that it's not put on a victim to supply us with all the information. So they it's so overwhelming. So they will do the legwork. They will even do conference calls with someone's health insurance to find out what benefits they have if there's some confusion around that. So they really work one on one with the families web, and there does not have to be an arrest. So we mentioned the court process, but for the Office of Victims the compensation program, we are different that we could assist victims of personal injury, sexual assault, assaults, victims of emotional injury, which means a direct threat of injury, which could be child pornography, release of intimate images, child witness changes. Yes, too. Yeah, sure. And if there's threats made in social media, and in that environment, we may be able to assist children who witness domestic violence, and I mentioned relatives of homicide. So they are certain group, groups, there's certain um claim amounts for for each group, there does not have to be an arrest. So many times, the compensation program is the only judicial office that a claimant may be working with, because there's certain cases sexual assault, human trafficking and domestic violence do not even have to be reported to the police to determine eligibility. Oh, wow. So there's those three cases do not have to be reported to the police. The others do, but there does not have to be a prosecution. If there was no arrest, they're not working with the judicial branch, right? So that doesn't have to be validated, right? Right? We have to verify that it was disclosed to certain professionals, right? And we could work with them on that. And many times, there's no time limit to use our funds. So if a claim is found eligible, and wepay some of the expenses that I mentioned, but somebody in 10 years needs counseling for what happened to them, and their claim was approved with the Office of Victim Services. There's funds remaining. They could contact us, and we could start making payment 10 years later on bills that are related. So there's no time limit. Time limit. We had a case where someone was a child, when the incident occurred, did not need counseling, had no expenses, until 14 years later, when they went to college out of state. They wanted to see a mental health counseling professional because of what happened to them 14 years ago. So prior to that, the parents applied. We stated your claim is eligible future expenses. So in this case, we didn't start make our first payment until 14 years after the incident and after the initial application was returned. There is a time limit for the applications. Once an application a decision is made and it's approved, there's no time limit to use the benefits. We do have a three year time limit to file with the Office of Victim Services, but we also have a waiver that someone could complete, and if they were a minor at the time of the incident, even if they're an adult.now, that would be a reason to grant it there. It's very specific statutory language, or if it's an adult and that someone was mentally, emotionally or physically unable to complete the application. So there is a waiver, and when we received the we waiver, I believe last Biennial, we approved 98% of them.

Nancy Barrow: 16:35

To be eligible for the compensation program, are the guidelines pretty broad?

Rachel McKnight: 16:40

The eligibility criteria as I mentioned, someone needs to be a personal injury or emotional injury where there's a direct threat relative. We also, as I mentioned, do you follow statute and regulations. So the crime needs to occur in Connecticut no matter. It doesn't matter if somebody lives in another state, if the crime occurred here, every state has their own compensation program. So if somebody was victimized in another state, they go by different policies and different statutes. They could always call our office and we will give them that state's information. The and all of us, the main thing we do follow is that you have to apply in the state where the crime or the crime? Yeah, our statute does state and we have to look at contributory conduct, or if there was a violation of a law that directly caused the incident. But we do look at the specifics of the incident. We do not look at someone's past history. We look at what happened then and again. Our statute states a violation of law has to directly or indirectly cause the incident. So if somebody there has to be a causation for it, it doesn't mean, if somebody is violating a law that it's automatically denied, because we look at the specifics, there must be cooperation with a police department and Office of Victim Services, if there was an investigation, however, if there was not cooperation, we do reach out to the claimant. And if it was because of fear that they didn't cooperate because of where they lived, it could it be a domestic violence situation, religious beliefs, we do look at other factors to determine eligibility when it comes to that.

Nancy Barrow: 18:23

You know, violent crime affects the whole family. How do you help the rest of the family with what's happened to someone if they're a victim of violent crime, or if they've been murdered.

Rachel McKnight: 18:34

In personal injury, cases of sexual assault, sexual assault, child abuse and domestic violence, relatives could file under the personal injury victim. So if there's a sibling of a victim of sexual assault, but they need their own counseling, they could apply for benefits through the compensation program for mental health counseling, for what happened to their sibling, as well as relatives of homicide, one of the expenses we would be able to assist with is out of pocket mental health counseling for the family members, and a large one is court percent proceedings and homicide cases for the relatives and family members as well. But in statute, it does say for personal injury, we can assist with relatives out of pocket expenses for what happened to their relative.

Marc Pelka: 19:24

If I'm not mistaken, children who witnessed domestic violence within the home would be eligible to apply for emotional injury claims as well. And I think so much about the survivor benefits too, that the compensation program offers for a dependent or a spouse or a partner who has a loved one taken from them may be eligible for survivor benefits. Someone who is contributing financially to a family and is removed from that family due to homicide, there is a benefit of up to$25,000 for which members of that family may be eligible. And I think about the amount of. Support that was provided through the Victim Compensation Program. Last year, it was about two a quarter million dollars in funding, and over half of that funding was for victimizations involving homicide. And I think that speaks to the ripple effect and the toll that that victimization has long after that person was taken from that family. So survivor benefits are a way to look to the future for a child will have funding and support available to them when they reach the age of 18. Talk about financial impacts. To imagine someone whose spouse was taken from them. You have a hole in your heart that will probably never be filled, and the level of grief and sorrow is just tremendous at the same time that you need time, sometimes infinite time, to process and grieve and proceed forward, bills could be piling up, and that person's income is no longer part. So that is one way, a small way, the compensation program, through that survivor benefit, can support somebody in the horrible aftermath of a homicide.

Rachel McKnight: 21:04

And Mark, thank you for bringing up child witness to domestic violence. I wanted to add it could be a relative or a non relative, so we could there could be a neighbor visiting the neighbor's house and a domestic violence incident occurs and they witnessed the incident. They could apply for our office under an emotional injury claim. Wow.

Marc Pelka: 21:22

I think we think a lot Nancy about ways we can partner as a program with the nonprofit service providers. So the I we mentioned Mothers Against Drunk Driving, I'd mentioned Harper Communities That Care and Mothers United Against Violence, on the Alliance to End Sexual Violence, the Coalition Against Domestic Violence. Those comprise the 40 contractors that OVS works with that receive federal funding called the Victim of Crime Act assistance, or VOCA assistance, that federal grant provides, in many cases, the bedrock of victim services in all 50 states and territories and DC across the United States. That program is funded as a result of mainly settlements from very large financial fraud crimes at the federal level, the funding is massive, but it's also highly volatile. It depends, oftentimes on the settling of a half a dozen cases in an average year. Although there are other deposits that are made, and those are every dollar counts, everyone's significant. It often is these large corporate settlements, and every year, Congress sets a cap to determine, based on the amount of deposits that have been made, how much funding can go out. And these nonprofits who are doing the critical work sometimes are unable to predict the fluctuations from one year to the next. Yeah, right. The General Assembly and the governor in Connecticut did a tremendous level of support. They used another federal grant called ARPA act to fill the gap in the funding. We're entering some very difficult periods, so the contractors I mentioned earlier, they're doing the nonprofit work to all array of victims, will promote the Victim Compensation Program, and that's an important pathway for the people that they're assisting and serving to learn about the compensation program. But now, in a period of decline in federal funding, the compensation program is seeking to partner more than ever before. In some ways they're doing that, as we're intending, in the next year, within the next year, to revise the compensation application, to simplify it into one application that will be more straightforward for the advocates to work with the victim on and for the victim to fill out. We need to make sure we're abiding by our federal law, state laws and procedures so that we are able to be good stewards. But we want to make the process as trauma informed and straightforward as possible. And also we're looking to help to assist getting the message out regarding compensation program so that people become receive greater awareness of the program and be there for it. And I think what's really nice is it can be very difficult. We find ourselves in April, you mentioned the the victims and survivors we're honoring, and one of them is the National Crime Victims Rights week, which is held every year, and it's to recognize the progress made to confront and remove barriers to victims exercising their rights and and I think about barriers coming down, it's about their ability to access services, receive advocacy. The theme this year is connecting kinship with healing. And I think that kinship is a very powerful word that I'm still unpacking in many different ways. And I think your audience will have insights that I haven't even pondered yet, but it means putting humanity at the center of the services that are provided. So something I think that Rachel was describing the program is encouragement that people who think they may be eligible for the program to call our office, because someone will pick up the phone. Monday to

Friday, eight to 4: 24:38

30pm staff are there, and I think that's a good feeling to know there's someone who will answer that phone and try to assist. Our phone number is 888-286-7347, that's 286, 7347 with an 888, toll free. And sometimes Rachel described very effectively and astutely, the eligibility criteria and other factors. What I like also that the claims examiners will do in assisting the victims is explaining their options, because part of putting humanity back at the center is lowering friction and challenge it is with accessing programs, but also empowering the victims to choose how best to prioritize.

Rachel McKnight: 25:19

The Office of Victim Services is a payer of last resort by statute, so health insurance Connecticut Paid Leave, any other financial source has to be considered first. Our claims examiners are not the experts and would refer someone to Connecticut Paid Leave, but they basically could explain the benefits that somebody receives, and this is because there's no time limit again for someone to use the funds. So if there's a collateral source that's going to pay for an expense, an eligible expense, now we want and it will benefit the claimant or the relatives of the families to go to that source first. So part of it is explaining the compensation program, but also explaining other collateral sources for somebody to go to first still apply with our office, but we'll work with that other Collateral source to consider any loss or expense after that collateral source.

Nancy Barrow: 26:14

Yeah, and maybe we can talk how Connecticut Paid Leave kind of intersects with with OVS, because we both offer financial support, obviously, for families when they need us most, right? And we have caregiver leave so they can take time away from work and help a loved one who needs help, maybe after being the victim of a violent crime. And we have the safe leave, which we give 12 days of income replacement, as well as Connecticut FMLA, they do the same thing, but you know, you can get your job back, but it's it's income replacement for survivors of domestic violence and, more recently, sexual assault survivors, to take time to seek medical care or psychological or other counseling for physical or psychological injury or disability of the victim, To obtain services from a victim services organization on behalf of the victim to relocate because of family violence or sexual assault and to participate in any civil or criminal proceedings related to resulting from the family violence or sexual assault. And of course, if the survivor continues to need treatment, then they can take the full 12 weeks of Connecticut Paid Leave if they need that, minus the 12 days that they may have taken for the safe leave. But I think we have similar missions, right? We have similar missions, and I think working together, our collaboration is just going to expand the services and allow for usage of both incredible agencies to help people.

Rachel McKnight: 27:46

Absolutely and and how we work with Connecticut Paid Leave is for a caretaker of a victim or a victim was medically unable to work because of the incident, and does not have to be domestic violence, sexual assault and court proceeding expenses. So for the first 12 weeks, if somebody is out for the maximum 12 weeks or two weeks, and their the payment from Connecticut Paid Leave is less than their average net pay prior to it, we could consider the difference, so that we're making you make up the difference, making up the difference to the person's average net prior to the incident. And then, if somebody's medically out of work for more than the 12 weeks, we can start on the 13th week, picking up the full net pay for salary loss that somebody had after we would do the 100% of somebody's net pay, wow. So we do not have a calculation, so sometimes there is a difference in the first 12 weeks that we want to make it so that somebody's getting their net pay, and then afterwards their net pay for the weeks that went over the initial 12 weeks. Wow, that's amazing.Connectivcut Paid Leave.

Nancy Barrow: 29:01

That you can that you can do that and supplement someone when they really need it, if it's longer than three months, you know. So that's that's really tremendous, what you what you do, and how we can work together.

Marc Pelka: 29:12

And this podcast, I think, is a joint venture to really clarify for your listening audience and to underscore the ways these two state entities are working together, Connecticut Paid Leave and office Victim Services compensation program, and it's a credit to a recently enacted law from October of last year regarding changes to the Paid Family and Medical Leave Act, or Public Act 24-5, because that law signed by the governor opened up new avenues for the programs to braid their financial assistance to victims, and Rachel did a great job of explaining how someone could participate in paid leave and compensation prior to October of last year, that was not possible, so we are seeking, through this podcast, to collaborate with Connecticut Paid Leave to get. The word out. And I think of a couple of cases about how a victim could participate in paid leave to receive wage replacement and victim compensation for somebody who is unable to work because of their physical injuries, they could receive wage replacement from paid leave, but also assistance with out of pocket medical expenses that enables them to have some peace of mind, to heal from their prescribed treatment and then return to work in a place that they that may be better than if they did not receive this ability. The way for the two programs also for a second case is somebody whose wage replacement, combined with the compensation could help them to reach their average net net income. We strive to help to make a victim whole, but this is a way of reducing a deficit that may exist. We think we're talking about so much Nancy today, about families. What about somebody who is contributes a necessary level of income to the family, but is injured due to crime and cannot work. These two programs can partner together again, not duplicating, but providing a braiding. There's a certain level that paid leave can reach, and there may be an ability for the compensation program to go the extra distance to reach that average net income. It'll never cover all the financial losses. We strive every day to do all that we can, but we need to be, you know, clear with ourselves that nothing can can fulfill the financial loss of a crime. And I mentioned, I mentioned two cases, but maybe I'll do a third, if you don't mind, and that's for some really very serious, potentially catastrophic injuries that may result from crime. There are certain, you know, there are 12 weeks that of wage replacement that are available under paid leave compensation, and may, in many cases, may be able to provide additional days or even weeks of coverage based on what can be braided, but that braiding is now possible because of the change in law. Prior to that, we were operating in isolation. These two entities now because of the policy change, we can collaborate, and this podcast is one of many opportunities Nancy were hoping to work with paid leave as compensation and help to convey and communicate information to victims and survivors.

Nancy Barrow: 32:03

I think that it's really, really important work

Marc Pelka: 32:04

We do, recognize working in victim services. You that you know both agencies are doing. confront and we talk a lot about vicarious trauma within our organization, we are lucky to avail ourselves of employee wellness support that the judicial branch makes available to its employees. We're seeking a variety of avenues to support staff who pick up the phone or read a file and are confronting some very serious tragedy, and we're looking, as an organization, to do more to support that kind of way that trauma can spread from somebody. We also look for ways to be optimistic, recognizing every situation is going to be different, but there are potential that these that the funding, the advocacy, the support, can help someone to become a thriver, you know, to potentially do something that maybe did not seem possible in the aftermath of crime. So there's optimism we try to find while maintaining realism and sensitivity and empathy toward what people are going through. There is the hope that this is something that a program that can be there with somebody as they progress through stages of recovery, sure, knowing that words through a podcast may be helpful in the moment, but it's a lot to process, and there are people available at our office to walk through any matter of detail they can your audience can reach us on the web by going to J, u, d, dot, C, t.gov/crime, victim. They are welcome to call our office at 888-286-7347, and email us at ovscompensation@jud.ct.gov, those are three ways, and we're always looking to do more interface with people interested in the program, but that is a way that can be a potentially a first call, email, click they can take to learn more about the program, And we look to be there to provide additional information and support and advocacy if they contact us.

Nancy Barrow: 34:06

Well I want to thank my amazing guests, Rachel McKnight and Marc Pelka, both from OVS the Office for Victim Services, for joining me for this discussion, and thank you both for being on The Paid Leave Podcast. It was really a pleasure talking to both of you and learning more about the program and getting the information out.

Rachel McKnight: 34:22

Pleasure talking to you, too. Nancy, thank you for having us, indeed.

Nancy Barrow: 34:25

For more information or to apply for benefits, please go to ctpaidleave.org. This has been another edition of The Paid Leave Podcast. Please like and subscribe, so you'll be notified about new podcasts that become available. Connecticut Paid Leave is a public act with a personal purpose. I'm Nancy Barrow, and thanks for listening.