The rural domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, and stalking program (rural program) is authorized by 34 U.S.C. 12341

The Office on Violence Against Women at the Department of Justice awarded The Shafer Center for Crisis Intervention $700,000 under the Rural Domestic Violence, Dating Violence, Sexual Assault, and Stalking Assistance Program (CFDA 16.589) on October 1, 2025.

The award funds the establishment and expansion of victim services in rural Mississippi, including a 24-hour crisis hotline, hospital and court accompaniment, community education, and sexual assault forensic medical examination and Sexual Assault Nurse Examiner (SANE) programs. These services target child, youth, and adult victims of domestic violence, sexual assault, dating violence, and stalking.

The Shafer Center, a nonprofit organization based in Hattiesburg, Mississippi, is the recipient. The performance period runs through September 30, 2028. Work is performed in Hattiesburg, MS 39401.

The Rural Program funds projects that identify, assess, and appropriately respond to victims in rural communities; establish and expand victim services; increase safety and well-being of women and children through direct response and crime prevention strategies; and develop or improve sexual assault forensic medical examination and SANE programs.

Rural program funds are used to support programs that: 1) identify, assess, and appropriately respond to child, youth, and adult victims of domestic violence, sexual assault, dating violence, and stalking in rural communities; 2) establish and expand victim services in rural communities to child, youth, and adult victims; 3) increase the safety and well-being of women and children in rural communities, by (a) dealing directly and immediately with domestic violence, sexual assault, dating violence, and stalking; and (b) creating and implementing strategies to increase awareness and prevent these crimes; and 4) develop, expand, implement, and improve the quality of sexual assault forensic medical examination or sexual assault nurse examiner programs. Grantees must use at least one of the following strategies in implementing their projects: 1) implement, expand, and establish cooperative efforts and projects among law enforcement officers, prosecutors, victim service providers, and other related parties to investigate and prosecute incidents of domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, and stalking; 2) provide treatment, counseling, advocacy, legal assistance, and other long-term and short-term victim and population specific services to adult and minor victims of domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, and stalking in rural communities; 3) work in cooperation with the community to develop education and prevention strategies directed toward such issues; 4) develop, enlarge, or strengthen programs addressing sexual assault; and 5) develop programs and strategies that focus on the specific needs of victims of who reside in remote rural and geographically isolated areas. Through this new OVW rural program project, the shafer center for crisis intervention, in partnership with the mississippi coalition against sexual assault, will implement enhancing the needs of sexual assault survivors in rural southeast mississippi. This victim service project addresses the following purpose area: 2 for jones, smith, covington, jasper, wayne, greene, jefferson davis, marion, and perry counties in southeast mississippi. Specific activities will include: 1) establishing two satellite rape crisis offices; 2) enhancing victim advocacy and counseling services in all nine rural counties; 3) developing, implementing, and training of sarts in all nine rural counties; and 4) providing trauma informed, evidence based, inclusive and excellent treatment and response to victims of sexual assault.