Title: People with Disabilities May Face Barriers Accessing Domestic
Violence Assistance

Description: People with disabilities may experience domestic violence
at a rate five times higher than those without disabilities. But
domestic violence centers may struggle to provide assistance to these
survivors. GAO's Elizabeth Curda, an expert on disability issues, joins
our podcast to tell us more.

Related work: GAO-24-106366, Federal Domestic Violence Assistance: HHS
Should Assess Accessibility-Related Technical Assistance for Local
Centers 

Released: September 2024

{Music}

[Elizabeth Curda:] All of the service centers we interviewed told us
that they faced challenges in meeting the specific needs of survivors
with certain disabilities.

[Holly Hobbs:] Hi and welcome to GAO's Watchdog Report, your source for
fact-based, nonpartisan news and information from the U.S. Government
Accountability Office. I'm your host, Holly Hobbs. People with
disabilities may experience domestic violence at a rate five times
higher than those without disabilities. But domestic violence centers
may struggle to provide assistance to these survivors. Today, we issued
a new report about federally funded domestic violence centers and
efforts to help those with disabilities gain access to the supports they
need. Here to tell us more is GAO's Elizabeth Curda, an expert on
disability issues. Thanks for joining us.

[Elizabeth Curda:] Thanks for having me.

[Holly Hobbs:] So, Elizabeth, we reported that people with disabilities
may experience domestic violence at a higher rate than those without
disabilities. Why might that be?

[Elizabeth Curda:] Well, you have to think about how this population
might differ from the general population. Typically, in domestic abuse
cases, we're thinking about a spouse or partner. But this is a
population that might require caregiving. So, this could be another
relative, this could be someone that they paid for care. And they could
be in very vulnerable situations with their caregivers. 

[Holly Hobbs:] Are the supports for people with disabilities different
than those without disabilities when it comes to domestic violence?

[Elizabeth Curda:] They shouldn't be. People who go to a domestic
violence shelter should be getting the same services, regardless of
whether they have a disability. These services can include obviously
shelter, but also counseling and legal advocacy for people dealing with
these difficult situations. And there are federal laws that require
shelters to provide reasonable accommodations to people with
disabilities so that they can receive equivalent services and access. If
a center is aware that a survivor has a disability, they can provide
reasonable accommodations such as sign language interpretation for a
deaf survivor, or a wheelchair accessible shower for someone with a
mobility impairment. But the centers can only provide these
accommodations if they are aware that the survivor has a disability. And
survivors may be reluctant to share that information. And this can be
for a variety of reasons. This could be out of concern for stigma, or
that they could be screened out, or in some cases, worry that they might
be institutionalized against their preferences.

[Holly Hobbs:] So for our report, we talked to some federally funded
domestic violence centers. What did they tell us about the challenges in
providing access and what they're doing to overcome those challenges?

[Elizabeth Curda:] Well, we visited 12 local centers, and each had taken
some steps to improve the physical accessibility of their shelters to
survivors with disabilities. But even with these efforts, officials at
quite a few of the centers we interviewed told us they needed other
updates or repairs to make their facilities more accessible. But even
with these efforts, all of the service centers we interviewed told us
that they face challenges in meeting the specific needs of survivors
with certain disabilities. The kinds of challenges that were frequently
cited included frequent turnover of staff, so you may lose the knowledge
of how to work with people who have disabilities. For example, staff who
have previously had training. It can be challenging to identify and work
with American Sign Language interpreters for deaf survivors because the
need for that interpretive services can be difficult to predict. And
shelters in older buildings may not always be accessible or easily
modified to ensure physical accessibility.

[Holly Hobbs:] So typically, when a program receives federal funding,
that comes with some federal oversight, right? Do we know what, if
anything, the Department of Health and Human Services is doing to
oversee access at domestic violence centers?

[Elizabeth Curda:] Yes, HHS uses a number of approaches to monitor the
performance of its family violence prevention grantees. They require
grantee reporting, and HHS will visit certain centers that it targets
for review. Prior to review, our review, these monitoring efforts
collected very limited and inconsistent information on state and local
centers' efforts to ensure accessibility. But during the course of our
review, HHS revised these monitoring tools so that they collect more
information on centers' accessibility efforts. So, the agency does
expect to have better information on what centers are doing and the
kinds of challenges they face. The other thing HHS does is it funds
training and technical assistance for domestic violence centers. These
programs deliver educational materials such as toolkits, briefing
documents, webinars, and they're intended to improve the capacity of
local centers to respond to and prevent domestic violence.

{MUSIC}

[Holly Hobbs:] Elizabeth just told us that accessibility at domestic
violence shelters is an issue, but that HHS is taking steps to better
monitor how federally funded centers provide access to survivors with
disabilities. So, Elizabeth, what more do we think HHS should be doing
to monitor accessibility of domestic violence centers?

[Elizabeth Curda:] Well, despite HHS' efforts in this area, most of the
local centers we visited told us they could benefit from more technical
assistance and accessibility--such as how to work with people with
traumatic brain injury, how to partner with disability organizations to
improve awareness of what kind of services that they provide. And we
recommended that HHS evaluate whether the accessibility-related
technical assistance it provides is meeting the needs of program
grantees to serve domestic violence survivors with disabilities. And
based on any evaluation that HHS does, we think they should take steps
to improve the quality and dissemination of its technical assistance and
ensure that it covers needed topics. 

[Holly Hobbs:] And last question what's the bottom line of this report?

[Elizabeth Curda:] Sure. Data show that people with disabilities
experience domestic violence at five times the rate of those without
disabilities. People with intellectual disabilities are especially at
risk. While local domestic violence programs are making efforts to
improve the accessibility of their services, some survivors may still
not be aware of or have access to those services. This is why it's so
important that HHS evaluate the technical assistance that it's providing
to domestic violence centers to ensure that that technical assistance is
really addressing the needs of the centers for information.

[Holly Hobbs:] That was Elizabeth Curda talking about our new report on
accessibility of federally funded domestic violence centers. Thanks for
your time, Elizabeth.

[Elizabeth Curda:] Thank you for having me.

[Holly Hobbs:] And thank you for listening to the Watchdog Report. To
hear more podcasts, subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or
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