The criminal justice program in Boise State University’s School of Public Service has been awarded a multi-year grant by the Idaho Council on Domestic Violence and Victim Assistance (ICDVVA) to produce a biennial report on victimization and victim services. The ICDVVA will use the data to evaluate systemic responses to victimization, improve services to crime victims and to ensure access of victims to their Constitutional rights.
The grant award is $174,625 for the first report, with $92,436 budgeted for subsequent editions. Work will begin on July 1, 2019. The first edition of the report will be completed in December of 2020.
The lead researchers will be Boise State criminal justice professors Lisa Growette Bostaph, Laura King and Lane Kirkland Gillespie. Boise State graduate students also will contribute to the project.
The report was one of 28 wide-ranging recommendations from Boise State’s 2015 “Crime Victims in Idaho: An Assessment of Needs and Services.” This report has received significant attention from the state legislature as a roadmap to improving services to crime victims.
The biennial victimization and victim services report will serve Idahoans by assuring that policymakers, lawmakers and service providers have the most comprehensive and timely data available.
“As the council works to ensure crime victims statewide have access to high quality services, these reports will help us focus on the current needs of victims and make data-driven decisions that truly make an impact,” said Nicole Fitzgerald, executive director of the Idaho Council on Domestic Violence and Victim Assistance.
Bostaph noted that, while crime victims’ rights have been the focal point of many legislative debates in the past few years, “what has truly been lacking is current, comprehensive data on the experiences and needs of crime victims across the entire state as our initial report is now four years old. The biennial nature of these new reports will fill that void.”