The washington state attorney general's office seeks funding to increase the identification and reporting of hate crimes and bias incidents in washington state through the "building community capacity…

This Project Grant award, provided by the U.S. Department of Justice's Bureau of Justice Assistance under the Khalid Jabara and Heather Heyer NO HATE Act (CFDA 16.048) program, will fund the "Building Community Capacity to Report Hate Crimes and Bias Incidents in Washington State" initiative. The $594,000 award to the Washington State Attorney General's Office aims to increase identification and reporting of hate crimes and bias incidents in the state. Key activities include:

• Establishing a statewide hate crimes and bias incidents hotline, to be piloted in three jurisdictions starting July 1, 2025 and scaled statewide by July 1, 2027.
• Partnering with community-based organizations representing groups most affected by hate crimes and bias incidents to develop culturally responsive, trauma-informed outreach and education strategies.
• Contracting with a marketing agency to create a multilingual public awareness toolkit to promote use of the hotline across diverse communities.

The award period runs from October 1, 2024 to September 30, 2028, supporting the Attorney General's Office in building sustainable infrastructure and community trust to improve hate crimes data collection and victim support in Washington.

The washington state attorney general's office seeks funding to increase the identification and reporting of hate crimes and bias incidents in washington state through the "building community capacity to report hate crimes and bias incidents in washington state" program. In 2024, legislation passed to create a statewide hate crimes and bias incidents hotline. This was in response to communities organizing together to address the stark increase in hate crimes and bias incidents in recent years, the widespread underreporting of such incidents, and the lack of a centralized reporting system and data on bias incidents in washington. The hotline will be piloted in three jurisdictions starting july 1, 2025, and scale statewide beginning july 1, 2027. The state-allocated funding from the 2024 legislation provides the base funding to operate the hotline. This project will provide critical funding to partner with community-based and/or population-specific organizations representing groups most affected by hate crimes, bias incidents, violence, and victimization. The goal is to ensure the new resource is informed by community, trusted by community, and is a culturally responsive, trauma-informed resource that effectively increases identification and reporting. The hotline's relevancy and ability to collect statewide data to inform policy decisions will only be effective if communities most impacted and targeted by hate crimes and bias incidents have the awareness and tools to identify and report such incidents. Each community-based organization (CBO) will execute an outreach and engagement strategy tailored to their community's specific cultural, linguistic, and other relevant considerations to inform and educate their community on identifying and reporting hate crimes and bias incidents. The attorney general's office will also contract with a marketing agency to develop a public awareness toolkit, translated into 16 languages, and accompanied by a dissemination plan to ensure accessibility and promote its use across diverse communities.