Breaking the Cycle: Expanding Support for Victims of Domestic Violence with Tina McBride

On this episode, we welcome Tina McBride, the Executive Director of the Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault Center (DVSAC), to continue our conversation on domestic violence. Tina shares valuable insights, facts, and personal experiences in her work with victims of violent crimes, hoping to inspire listeners to take action and support those in need.

She recounts the origins of the center, which began as a group of women volunteering to support victims, discussing women's issues like finances and jobs. Over time, their work expanded to help victims of domestic violence, and eventually, their services grew to support children, teens, adults, and the elderly, serving up to 1,100 victims annually. The center works closely with law enforcement and prosecutors, ensuring victims get the help they need, including forensic medical exams and anonymous reporting for those not ready to disclose their identity.

Tina talks about the intensity of crimes today, generational trauma, and how domestic violence impacts entire families, not just the direct victims. She also shares her vision for the future, including the creation of a Family Justice Center, a one-stop shop for victims to access a wide range of resources under one roof. This is part of her goal to leave a lasting impact on the community before passing the torch to the next generation of leaders.

Throughout the episode, Tina emphasizes the importance of volunteerism, advocacy, and how everyone can make a difference in helping victims transition from survival to thriving. Whether through donating, volunteering, or simply offering a supportive ear, she encourages listeners to get involved and make a positive impact in their communities.

Transcript

I like to say that DVSAC is the bridge from surviving to thriving. No, we were not there to be the 100% foundation for the rest of their lives. That's not our goal. Our goal is to help them create a foundation that will support that should they need them. They can alwaD3:D45 into them as they grow and thrive.

They really need us. They need us to watch out for them. They need us to speak up for them. And if you have a concern, you need to tell somebody what their concern is. Today on the We Share podcast, executive director of the Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault Center Tina McBride.

Welcome to the We Share podcast I'm Julie. I'm Alex. We share ourselves and we provide a platform for others to share. We believe everyone has a purpose and a story to tell. And we're back on the We Share podcast. I'm Julie and I'm Alex, and we have part two today to yes, continuing the domestic violence. Or at the DVSAC.

We had Anna Grewal, that board president with the dv sec last week, and we're so excited to have the executive director here, Tina McBride, today. And we are going to find out the story. You know how they got started? She's going to share so much information with us, some facts, and hopefully I'll inspire you to to chase something of your own to so or to help people.

Yeah, yeah. Help people. Hey, Tina. Hey. Good morning. How are you ladies? Good morning. Well, let's just kick it off. Tell us how you've obviously been around with DV sac forever. Tell us the origins of that and how long you've been working with them. DV sac is actually, If I do my math right, I believe we were 44 years old this year.

It is a grassroots, grassroots organization that was grown right here in Idaho Falls, in the late 70s. There was a group of women that got together, and they did brown bag luncheons once a week, and they were talking about women's issues at that time, finances, you know, jobs, you know, just living independently and out of those luncheons, there were two crimes they seen that women talked about quite regularly.

One is domestic violence, and the other is, rape. And so actually, there were two entities that were formed. One was called Women Against Domestic Violence and the other was called Rape Response. And these two entities started serving these populations of women. And this was before there was even funding available. I mean, there really had not been anything done federally at the federal level to help provide funding.

Nothing in this state level. Nothing. They were just volunteers coming together saying, we need to help people be safe. So DV sec was Women Against Domestic violence and oh, I want to say the early 90s and then they changed their name. Still focused primarily on domestic violence. There were some other violent crimes that sometimes came in.

Rape response did the same thing. They formed and they were working with victims of rape and specifically adult victims. You know, nobody was really working with the kids at that particular point in time. There wasn't really kind of a focus there. So, from that then, I have to do my math. And it's been a it's been about 20 years ago.

Ray response closed and, funders because by then we did have funding that allowed us to do jobs, to hire staff, to have offices to provide counseling, to do 24 hour crisis lines, shelter, all this stuff. They closed down. Our local funders came and said, okay, you're already working with violent crime victims. Can you take this population on?

We said, sure, let's do that. So we started working with the adult victims of violent crime. By then, there was a third entity, help Inc., and that agency started based on survivors of child sexual abuse. So they were primarily focused at the time they started on, individuals who are now adults but had been sexually abused as children and providing them help and support.

So we now have two agencies. We're focusing on adults, they're focusing on children. And it's been almost ten years ago that Health Inc. closed and again, funders came back and said, well, you now take on children. And, again and that component, we went back and by now we work very closely with law enforcement and prosecutors and said, okay, do you think this is a good fit for us?

This is what they're asking. And they're like, yes, we believe this will work. So today, DBS, AC, DBS, AC serves children, teens, adults and elderly victims of violent crime all the way across the board. And in a year's time frame, we will be working with anywhere from 950 to 1100 victims per year. Like that. And tell us the regional boundaries.

How far do you guys reach when you're helping people? Most of our population is based in Out Falls and Bonneville County, okay. Because that's where, the largest population within eastern. Yeah. It's just dense. Yes. Yeah. It is where we are when it comes to forensic. So like DBS, AC has two specialty services. It provides forensic interviews and forensic medical exams.

And when it comes to those services, those services are much more limited. And so when we're looking at forensic services, we will serve Butte County. We've gone up into Custer County and the chalice area. We have at times help support Lemhi County Week. On the on the east side we go clear over into Pinedale, Wyoming, because when you look at the Jackson area and the Pinedale area, they do not have a lot of advocacy services, period.

And so they will contact us and we'll do forensic interviews on children. So anybody under the age of 18 and we will sometimes end up doing forensic medical exams. Also, we spent quite a bit of time over at Saint Johns and Jackson, and doing, forensic medical exams on adults and children who've been sexually assaulted. So it depends upon the service with primary focus here.

But, you know, our nursing staff and our advocate are forensic interviews, staff and advocates. They will travel to outlying areas as needed to provide those services to those kids and families. Can you? Yeah. So many people ask somebody to for a day. Yeah. Can you, just touch on the importance of having that forensic component? Because there's obviously the therapy component to it, but there needs to be a Justice Park portion of this.

And the forensic comes into that. The forensic does come into that. And especially for people, you know, like as adults, if you are a victim of a sexual assault, you can report anonymously so you can still come in and get that forensic medical exam, all the treatment that comes with that. And you do not have to provide anything to law enforcement.

Our nurses will go through whatever parts of the exam you want to go through, obtain, like if you say, I want to do a full sex assault kit, they will do all of that. But that kit then is stored for 55 years plus one day within the county that that incident happened. So like if, if, if the incident occurred or the crime occurred in Bonneville County, then it's going to go to the Bonneville County Sheriff's Office.

There's nothing on that evidence that identifies you and it says nothing about you. It's a number. It's a case number. And if the person decides and we've had this happen, they come back later and say, okay, I want to move forward with this, and I want to disclose who did this to me. And then they can go pull those cases and they can continue to process that case and help that victim move forward in that process.

After that, I just want to say that's a really good benefit to the female that's feeling like not ready to tell. Yes. But by coming in, disclosing it, you have a backup plan. Yes. If you do ever need to do it. Yes. Because versus wait two years, then try to remember everything and file a report. Correct and possible.

Correct. And that's something that's really, when they are doing medical history and, the nurses are working with a patient, they're very, very detailed in what they are gathering. And so they're getting all of that, which can then just be given to law enforcement, and law enforcement can build on that foundation that this person already created with children.

Everybody is a mandated reporter. Children's crimes cannot be kept anonymous. You as an individual can stay anonymous, but you have to be able to identify the child, give some basic information about the child where either law enforcement or CPS can locate that child so that they can follow up on that report. Can we pause for a second?

I think that's a really important thing for people to know, because we have a saying and we interviewed Brian Level about something completely different the other day. But the saying is if you see something, say something. Yes. And this is a very important part of that, that even when you call and say, I am really worried about this kid, they're they're nine years old, they go to this school, this is the last name of the parent that and then you can stay completely anonymous with that.

That is so important that people know that that's possible. The thing about children is, one, children are extremely resilient. And that's been something that was really surprising to me, is I didn't expect to see over 300 children a year come through our center, but we do, and 50% of these children end up doing forensic interviews. Probably another 25% will do, forensic exams.

All of them get advocacy, all of them get referrals to other supportive services. I like to say that dvsa AC is the bridge from surviving to thriving. You know we we're not there to be the 100% foundation for the rest of their lives. That's not our goal. Our goal is to help them create a foundation that will support that should they need them.

They can always step back into them as they grow and thrive. And kids are amazing at this awesome. And so it's really important for people to be their voice. They don't care about whatever's on their platter is what they get to deal with. And so they really need us. They need us to watch out for them. They need us to speak up for them.

And if you have a concern, you need to tell somebody what that concern is. Okay, let's move on to I wanted to just ask you a personal question. Having been involved in this for 30 years, that's a lot of weight on somebody's shoulders. How have you. Because for me, I would think that this job has some sort of a shelf life that you would expire all of the emotions that you had available for it.

How have you been able to maintain that? First of all, it's not my journey. You know, I had a journey. I took my journey. Right. So the people that are coming through the door, this is their journey. And again, it's being that supportive process. And sometimes on their journey, they'll work with us through Claire till the end, sometimes through the journey they go, yeah, I do a 360 and they decide now if I'm going to go do something different.

I'm going back and I need to try this again. And so it's not taking that personal, just being there, for them, regardless of their choice. And helping them again cross that bridge. We want homes to be safe. I spent 20 years working with people who batter. I have to tell you, I liked that, and I think that's the key to stopping, because a lot of this is learned behavior and it's beliefs of how this is how you handle this.

It's the tools that I have. And so then it's really going in and teaching them new tools and helping them also create safe homes and become better parents, become better partners, become better coworkers, because our behavior overflows into everything. And so I think it's just it has been my journey. And then also I've been able to expand our budget to bring in more people to do the work, because initially, I'll be honest, when I took the job, I said, I'm giving you five years and I've renewed that contract now, what, six, six times?

You know, and also, as long as I feel like I'm contributing, as long as I feel like I've got something good to offer, I don't plan on being there for the rest of my life. And I know that at some point there will be somebody who can come in and they can take this foundation and they can expand it even more.

I just hope I leave a really good, solid foundation for others to build on. That's really it. That seems like it's I mean, it's just your calling. It's your passion. It. I do still have passion for that. And that has not left me. And, you know, wanting to see I do have one more small project I want to work on, and I'd like to see it completed before I leave.

And that is, you know, for our community to have a family justice center, our region, to have a family justice center, and to be essentially almost like a one stop shop where victims of violent crime can come in and find as many resources as possible under one roof. And DVS is not going to be every one of those resources.

It's going to be built in partnerships. And, you know, again, can across that bridge and teaching them to thrive and giving them that opportunity. So I would like to leave on that note and say here to somebody, well, the ripple effect that you've created that goes very far. Yeah, I could share that 30 years of knowledge with us.

Do the crimes look different now than they did when you started? They do look different. And we have talked about that and then the opportunities to, for advocates now, what we have seen probably over the last five years is the intensity of some of these crimes. It's it's increasing. And the damage done to victims is a horrific.

Some of what I'm seeing, too, is that, the individuals who are perpetrating these crimes, they are they have long histories and it's like, okay, I understand a balance in the system and I understand giving people chances. But at some point when you can't get a handle on the violence and you see somebody that has multiple victims throughout their lifetime, we have to say enough is enough and we have to have some consequences here, because again, you will have somebody who's perpetrating a crime, and that is also probably parenting at some point in their life.

If you have a victim in a crime. But I'm now on third generations and I keep asking our MDE team members whether we're working on domestic violence cases or child abuse cases, or sometimes in a community forum talking about other services and things that are going on. If you don't like the outcomes that we're getting, what are we going to do different because we've been doing some of this stuff for a very long time, and I don't think our outcomes are really very good at this point.

And so I will ask them, what do we want to do different and how are we going to do a different? That's interesting to help generational trauma you're really working with? And I, I'm sure you have family connections that have gone back three generations. I'm sure that's not. No, it's not an exaggeration. No. Yeah. And if you probably trace that back, it's going to go beyond those three populations.

Those are the three generations I know of that you got to witness. Yeah. What would you say if, if, if there's a, if we're looking at this ongoing we want to see different outcomes. What's the strongest need right now for DV S.A.C.. What. Or is it domestic violence. Because I know in my interviews with law enforcement of violence between partners has increased dramatically over the last few years, what are you seeing?

The biggest increase? Is it domestic violence? What I am seeing is our child abuse cases, and our DV cases are almost running parallel to each other. So between out of all those victims that I talked about, you will have 350 and 350 that are victims of DV or victims of term of child abuse. The other thing that kind of gets lost too, and this needs to be addressed.

And and finding funding in a better way to address this is that children in DV situations, people have a tendency to believe they're not the direct victim. So in other words, they've not been physically harmed, they've not been sexually harmed, but they're living in this chaos. And children of domestic violence are more likely as adult victims to need mental health services.

The children who've been direct victims of a violent crime, that's huge. Because that's one model about behavior. That's a learned behavior foundation's place and all that impact on their mental health. That because we are so focused on the adults and getting them help, that process of getting intervention and services into those kids that is lacking. And we need to fix that gap.

So a domestic violence case is actually a family case. It's not just a partner case. Domestic violence impact affects the adults, the children, the pets and the house plants. Everything in that home is impacted by those behaviors. Yeah. Okay. Should we move on to the events that's coming up. We can let's go back to that. So that's tonight.

We talked about it last Wednesday. Let's recap that a little bit. Tell us about tonight okay. So tonight is going to be a preview. This past winter I received a call from, an individual that I had worked with, in civic organizations, and she'd been a supporter of TBC. Well, she has her whole lifetime, and she still is.

That's why she reached out to me. And she said, Tina, I have a friend who has passed away. As she says, she has tons of art in her home, her daughter, and it's actually her stepdaughter, but her daughter lives out of state, and she can't afford to have all of this art shift back. There to her. And by the time we were done and it was all cataloged, there were 152 pieces of art that were donated to Cassie after Mary, Betty is who she's, known more as in our community.

Cap Williams passed away, and she'd been collecting this art her entire adult life. And when I initially and I were walking through this house and I'm like, oh my gosh, and I know nothing about art, I'm like, okay, I'm kind of like, a ship out of water. I don't, I know nothing. So luckily I have great board members that stepped in and and they started working on this and have spent the summer cataloging this, getting, appraisals and certifications put together on these pieces of art.

So this evening, there will be between 40 and 45 pieces of art that are going to be shown. Some of the art is going to be, silent auction to this evening. And the art also, there will be other pieces that come up into more shows over the next year that have yet to be planned. So this is just a glimpse into what Betty and her late husband left to us, to share with the community.

What will also happen is all the funds raised on these art pieces will go back to DCC, and our conversation has been again, going back to that Family Justice Center is taking these dollars and placing them in a special account that helps us start to build funds to purchase or have somebody donate a building. And we get to renovate the building, whatever happens, so that we can have a family justice center.

So that has been some of the discussion. Our goal for the event this evening, it will be held at the colonial Art center upstairs. And, the Wheeler's Art Gallery. I can't tell you specifically the room. I know, it's just. Yeah. Upstairs. Yeah. It's a beautiful place. If even if you don't land on the room first, you're going to wander through some beautiful things before you get to the room.

You are, you are. And, they're going to have lighter nerves. There will be wine available. And as for people to come and take a look, and if you see pieces you want to start bidding on, maybe there's, artists that you are already collecting and you want to build on that collection that you have. You can come in and start doing that, and we just want to see people.

I love seeing people's faces. We have a ton of support within the community, and I love it when people just pop in and show up and we just get to talk and reconnect. Yeah. So I hope to see a lot of people there this evening and, taking a look at the art that we have and getting me excited for yet.

Question about, your current building. How did you come up on that? Was that donated? Part of it was donated. It was, the old Hatch Clinic. So it belonged to the Hatch family, and it has sat empty for quite a few years. And so they donated a portion of the building. And then the CHC Foundation came in and they helped purchase a portion of the building.

We carried a mortgage for probably about six years or so, and I went back to the CHC Foundation and asked them if we could, get a grant to pay off that mortgage. So when I talk about getting a new building and get really excited about that, there's also this huge fear factor, because I know this building inside and out, we owe nothing on it.

We just replaced our roof. The summer and the CHC Foundation again came in and helped us with that. So I know my costs and I know how to budget for that. And so but you could sell that building and use those funds towards another building. We could our hope is to be able to sell that building and help us sustain a new building, because that's going to bring new unknown costs on a monthly basis.

Okay. So this this is a charge to anyone listening. If you have a building that you've just been sitting on and I mean, we've got a, Bill and I this follows up, what I'm about to say follows up with that and what you were saying before that, which is we get people on the political talk show who text in all the time frustrated about what's happening on our country level, on the federal level, things like that.

And I will repeatedly say, you want to make a difference in this world, make a difference in your community, because that's where you can fall in and in, even in your home. Yes, and that's where it starts. So, this is a this you have opportunities in your community. This is one of them. There will be two more upcoming events where art will be available.

But if you're not into art, there's other ways you can help the DVSa. See, there's lots of ways to volunteer. Or maybe you know someone that you can recommend that can get involved with them. Or it might even just be actually saying something once you saw something. Yes, maybe this podcast will help you out. Yeah. Help you do that.

Yes. And that's the overall goal. Regardless of whether we're doing whether we are fundraising, whether at a community event, our overall goal really is to create a safer community, safer homes, provide healthy opportunities that are going to provide, positive outcomes. I have a question for you. Do you do any, like, advocacy work in the public schools where you go in and talk to these teens and, and explain like maybe what is right and what is wrong?

Because they might not know. We can when we're invited in. We have in the past tried to get our local school districts to adopt some prevention programs and stuff like that, and they're like, you know, we have plenty of bullying things going on already, and we've got a lot going on. So we're already working on that prevention aspect and stuff.

So if we are invited in by a teacher. Yes. Now, one of the new things that has happened is opting in with parents and probably for schools, that becomes kind of burdensome because you need to know what's being presented, and it may be material that you have to ask parents, is it okay if our children hear this information and they have to opt in for that?

And that can become a lot of work? And that's kind of sad, because then things that should just be general discussion, general education. It's happening. Well and maybe their parents are not present or working and and so they're not having those conversations with their teens. Yeah. So so we will go in. We do go in regularly monthly to three be.

Yeah. Work with kids that are at risk. And in the system there. So is there an age limit with your organization? Say, I'm a 16 year old girl and I've experienced sexual assault, but I don't want my parents to know, is there an age limit in Idaho where someone can contact you and then the parents aren't told no, and especially not again with new legislation.

So prior to July 1st of this year, teens 14 years of older used to be able to go and reach out for their own mental health treatment and their own medical services, especially like at district seven for birth control and things like that. They now we are required to get parental permission for all treatment for all children for absolutely up to the age of 18.

Yes. Okay. And that even includes child protection services, any type of medical or mental health provider. Nobody is exempt from that. So what do you do if it's the parent that's the perpetrator and hurting them? Those are some things that are a little difficult, and we're all trying to figure out how you work around those. And hopefully, you know, hoping that children feel like they have a safe enough system, that there's somebody that they can report that to and that person can make that report.

But also under the age of 18, anybody that is disclosing something to you where they've been sexually or physically abused, you know, if there's some sort of maltreatment going on, we are mandated to report that. Yeah. Oh what a what an interesting you're in a juxtaposition there. Like there is good on both sides. That's difficult. That's a difficult path for you to walk.

Yep. Wow. All right. We're running close to being done here. We always give our guests an opportunity to just leave us with some personal information. Like, maybe know I always call it a nugget. Yeah, a little nugget of truth. Or like, you're you're like Tina McBride. I could, and it doesn't even need to be connected to that legacy.

Yeah, yeah. If you were to sit down with someone and share your bit of wisdom, what would it be? My bit of wisdom would be that we can all make. We can all have impact on our community and we're in charge of our butts. We really are. So we are. You're driving your bus. What you do with your bus is entirely up to you, and you know you can be a part of the bridge of helping somebody moving from survival to thriving.

You don't have to carry the whole load along. You know, just being a supportive person and saying, hey, I know there's a place where you can go, or making the phone call where you gather some information to help someone else, a little bit of guidance. We'll gladly do that. On a personal note, what I would say is, I don't know if y'all know this.

Martina McBride is my twin sister. She got the voice. I got the looks. I did not know that disclaimer. That's not true. It is very, very true. Okay. All right. Well, so nice to meet you. Now, even more, I know that you're slightly famous. We love fame. Fan of it. Yeah. And I do like Martina McBride I do too.

She has some pretty great songs. If you listen to her lyrics, they're pretty powerful. They're definitely like women. Yeah. Power strong. Yeah. Yes. Yeah. Power songs. Yeah. Well, thank you so much. What do you want to leave, like a phone number? How can people get in contact with you? A website, things like that. We do have a website and it has tons of information on it.

WW dot dvsa c c dawg. We have a 24 hour crisis line 208235241 to say that one more time (208)235-2412 perfect and you are on Instagram. Are we on Instagram? I talked to you last weekend and I tagged at the wrong one because I left off the extra AC. So if there is advice I see, track that one initially and then an AC.

Yeah, yeah, I had another AC and I'm like, okay, yeah, get on it. Yeah. Well we really hope that by you joining us today. If it just helps just one person or if one person gets fired up to come and help volunteer or donate, or if one child gets help or if one adult, you know, even I thought an interesting point that you made was survivors that hit it for years still need help.

So even if it's someone who listens to this and goes, it's time. It's time for time to let go and heal. And. Yeah, sure. Sorry. Yeah. Thank you Tina. Thank you.

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