Rural Wisconsin crime reduction program to present at international policing conference

A new partnership of social service agencies in Vernon County is trying to reduce the harms of domestic violence, and it’s getting international attention. 

Local leaders will share the success of their rural violent crime reduction initiative at the the International Association of the Chiefs of Police’s 2024 Conference and Exposition next week

The program’s manager Susan Townsley is the clinic director for Stonehouse Counseling in Viroqua. She told WPR’s “Wisconsin Today” the county received a $200,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Justice to pay for training local law enforcement, clinicians and volunteers to better respond to domestic violence cases. 

That includes a new Help End Abuse Response Team, or HEART, that joins officers on domestic violence calls — after police secure the scene — to provide victims with resources to help them leave the abusive relationship.

“We know that victims are unlikely to call, and when they do call, it’s super important to make sure that we get them the right resources they need at that time,” Townsley said. “Because if we wait, the chance (is) that their perpetrator is back in the house, or they’ve been texting, and the cycle of abuse starts all over again.”

The program is a collaboration among a handful of local social services agencies, along with the Vernon County Sheriff’s Office, Department of Human Services, and District Attorney.

Sheriff Roy Torgerson told WPR that policing domestic violence in a rural community like his has its own challenges with longer response times for officers covering distant communities, but he’s seeing the new program make things easier on his deputies.

“It took a while to sell this to the officers. That’s with any change you implement in law enforcement, they go through so much training,” Torgerson said. “But we got the officers to realize that these advocates and the HEART volunteers are there to take some of that load off of the officers, so they can focus on their job.”

The initiative also trains local health care providers to provide sexual assault examinations, and it added domestic violence assessments and group sessions for perpetrators with the goal of stopping them from reoffending.

Sheriff Torgerson said it’s hard to quantify the success of the partnership in terms of local domestic violence statistics, but he sees real progress in the increased level of support victims are now receiving.

“Too often, (officers) spend more time with the perpetrator than with the victim, and that’s wrong.” Torgerson said. “That’s where the HEART team supplements that, and we’re able to get these volunteers with the victim and share those resources.”

Stonehouse Counseling’s Townsley serves on HEART and has also seen firsthand how the right resources and support are making a difference for survivors in their community.

“We came out to a call and sat with the victim to help her understand the cycle of abuse that she was in,” Townsley said. “At the end, she said ‘If you all hadn’t come, I would be back with him by tomorrow morning.’”

Townsley and Sheriff Torgerson hope that by presenting their program at the International Association of the Chiefs of Police’s 2024 Conference, they can encourage other communities around the world to form partnerships to reduce domestic violence.