Below is the summary of the Violence Against Women Act 2000, posted on the National Network to End Domestic Violence (NNEDV) web site, accessed on Sep. 28, 2005:
Title I: Strengthening law enforcement
- Creates purpose areas in law enforcement grant programs to provide equipment and technical assistance to facilitate enforcement of protective orders.
- Clarifies that grantees must certify that their state laws, practices and policies do not require the victim to bear the costs of filing criminal charges or protective orders.
- Prohibits offender notification of a protective order that has been registered in the enforcing state. Gives tribes full civil jurisdiction over the enforcement of protective orders on Indian lands.
- Provides funds for training sexual assault forensic medical examiners in evidence collection, expert testimony and treatment of trauma.
- Provides for a 5% set aside out of state formula grants for court programs.
- Provides set aside funding for state domestic violence and sexual assault coalitions to coordinate state victim services activities.
- Reauthorizes Grants to Encourage Arrest, Rural Domestic Violence and Child. Victimization Grants, and the STOP State Grants.
- Adds dating violence to most grant programs.
- Strengthens language on interstate crimes of domestic violence, violation of protective orders, and interstate stalking.
- Adds use of mail or any facility of interstate or foreign commerce to interstate stalking.
Title II: Strengthening Services to Victims
- Creates an authorizing statute for the legal assistance to victims program, and expands the program for victims of sexual assault as well as domestic violence.
- Reauthorizes the Federal family Violence Prevention Services grants for shelter and services at $175 million each year for five years.
- Creates a transitional housing assistance grant program to provide short-term housing assistance to victims of domestic violence.
- Reauthorizes the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 2 million each year for five years.
- Authorizes federal studies of insurance discrimination, workplace effects, unemployment compensation and parental kidnapping laws.
- Creates new funding areas for programs addressing the needs of older and disabled victims including targeted outreach and support.
Title III: Safe Havens for Children
- Creates a grant program for supervised visitation and safe exchange.
- Includes extensive reporting requirements for jurisdictions receiving this funding.
- Focuses these grants on collaboration with domestic violence programs and on underserved populations.
- Reauthorizes court-appointed special advocates in child abuse cases.
- Provides funding for training programs for judicial personnel and practitioners.
Title IV: Strengthening Education and Training
- Provides $7.5 million funding for training, consultation and technical assistance on domestic violence, stalking and sexual assault against women with disabilities.
- Includes a priority area for technical assistance on the requirements of shelters and programs under the Americans with Disabilities Act.
- Reauthorizes rape prevention programs for education, training, hotlines and awareness campaigns at $80 million per year for five years.
- Directs the National Institute of Justice to work with the Bureau of Justice Statistics and the National Academy of Sciences to develop a research agenda on violence against women.
- Directs the Attorney General to establish a task force to develop a coordinated strategy for research on domestic violence in consultation with national domestic violence groups.
- Directs the Attorney General to evaluate existing standards for sexual assault forensic exams and develop a national recommended protocol and training.
- Reauthorizes education and training programs on issues raised by domestic violence and child sexual assault in custody and visitation.
Title V: Battered Immigrant Women
- Improves access to cancellation of removal, suspension of deportation and other immigration protections for victims of domestic violence.
- Creates exceptions to moral character provisions for acts or convictions related to battering or extreme cruelty.
- Allows funding in VAWA grant programs to be used for immigration assistance.
Sep. 28, 2005 – NNEDV
