"Creating a Framework for the Wisdom of the Community:" Review of Victim Services in Nunavut, Northwest and Yukon Territories

2.0 Nunavut (cont'd)

2.0 Nunavut (cont'd)

2.4 Review of Programs in Other (Non-Nunavut) Remote Aboriginal Communities (cont'd)

2.4.4 Best Practices

Victim Services[32]
Rocky Victim Services, Rocky Mountain House, Alberta: Community Development Approach

Rocky Mountain House is in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains west of Red Deer, Alberta. The Rocky Victim Services program has been successful in engaging the Sunchild and O’Chiese First Nations communities near Rocky Mountain House, Alberta, in a community development approach towards victim support and services. At this time, the Victim Services Coordinator reports that victim services volunteers are known to all community members and are expected and asked for during times of violence and crisis. All the volunteers are non-Aboriginal, as is the Coordinator.

The Victim Service Coordinator has worked towards this goal of trust, acceptance and cooperation through a variety of methods. She initially asked the community, through its leaders, women’s groups and elders, how she and the volunteers could help the community. As a result they undertook the following activities:

A good deal of the success of this program is due to the informed and confident approach of the Victim Services Coordinator. She has taken a sensitive, ‘hands-on,’ direct approach in getting to know the communities. This program is notable and can be considered a "best practice" largely because the coordinator has understood the unwritten, and largely unspoken, societal norms of most Aboriginal communities. These norms, or protocols for personal interaction and relationships, have been described earlier and confirmed throughout the consultation process undertaken during this research, but they can be summarized here as follows:

In summary, and as described in section 2.1.2, Aboriginal and Inuit communities function more from the ‘heart.’ Therefore, programs relying on paperwork, rules, hours of business, deadlines, formal meetings and red tape will not be as successful as programs built on established and committed personal relationships, consultation, inclusion and consensus. In short, people’s sense of community harmony and ownership, built on personal feelings of trust and respect, are more important than forming committees, filling out forms and holding formal meetings.

Three Sisters Haven Society, Sexual Assault and Women’s Assistance Centre, Dease Lake, BC: Combining the Regional Women’s Shelter and Victim Services

This northern BC program is located just south of the BC/Yukon border in the small, largely Aboriginal community of Dease Lake. First Nations in this region include the Tahltan, the Tlingit and the Kaska.

The Three Sisters Haven Society is a community-based Victim Services program. In addition, it operates an emergency short-term shelter for assaulted women and children, as well as an array of non-residential stand-alone victim services for both men and women. These services are in the same building, but in separate areas. There are two paid staff and a small group of volunteers who work in both the emergency shelter and in the other Victim Services programming. This program is a ‘best practices’ example of how services for victimized women in remote locations can be combined into a more cost effective, efficient and useful format which is better able to meet the needs of all victims, and especially female victims of crime.

This program is able to provide, with paid and trained staff, the following services to both Dease Lake and the surrounding Aboriginal communities:

This program works closely with the local RCMP detachment and with the local, band-sponsored Aboriginal Justice Program. They state that their program responds as much as possible to the needs of victims. All clients are encouraged to make their own informed choice about the manner in which they wish to handle their situation. All clients are given full information about their options and are supported in whatever choices they make.

Respondents state that this combination of services works very well in sparsely populated, isolated locations where services, and trained service providers, are in short supply.

RCMP Victim Assistance Volunteers, Yukon Territory: Immediate Assistance to Victims

Several Canadian jurisdictions offer police-based victim services besides the Yukon Territory. However, in the Yukon, community victim services volunteers become auxiliary RCMP constables to increase their availability to victims. This status also allows volunteers access to files and ongoing police investigations, and immediate access to victims. They are available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

There are 11 full-time Victim Services Coordinators available throughout the Yukon. However, most are located in Whitehorse and are available mostly during working hours. The use of auxiliary RCMP constables extends the availability and level of service available to victimized individuals.

Yellowknife Women’s Centre, NWT: Multi-Faceted, Accessible Services to Victimized Women

The Yellowknife Women’s Centre is notable as a "best practice" because of its full service, ‘open door’ approach to victimized women and children. This centre receives a small amount of funding from the Government of the Northwest Territories but is otherwise funded through the delivery of specific programs such as Health Canada’s Prenatal Nutrition Program. No funding is tied in name to "victimized women and children" although virtually all clients fall within this category.

The Yellowknife Women’s Centre is a street-front operation offering the following services to any women and children who come to the centre:

Because of its open door policy, this centre has become a magnet for all women in the NWT and Nunavut. Many women and children, fleeing abusive situations in their home community, relocate to Yellowknife because they know of this, and other, albeit less accessible, social services. It deserves mention as a "best practice," as it is, like the program in Dease Lake, one of the few easily accessible, multi-faceted emergency services available to victimized women and children in northern Canada.

YWCA Women and Children’s Healing and Recovery Program, Yellowknife, NWT: Recovery for Chronically Victimized Women and Children

This program, open to all NWT[33] women and children, has a mandate to address the long-term treatment needs of chronically traumatized women and children. The program is 10 months in length and can be attended as a day program or on a residential basis. Its goal is to help women rebuild lives shattered from a lifetime of living in violent, chaotic relationships.

There are several program components including:

This program is notable as a "best practice" as it addresses the need for a comprehensive, integrated approach in assisting chronically victimized women gain control of their lives. It gives them the skills, stability and knowledge to break free from the ongoing cycle of violence, addictions and abuse.

Aftercare, in-home family support, housing and other services work in cooperation with the YWCA in assisting program participants to access and use their services. Program participants receive financial support from the government while they remain in the program.

Happy Valley - Goose Bay Victim Services, Labrador: Employing Community Victim Services Para-Professionals

This program has devised an efficient method of providing victim services in the remote Inuit and Innu communities of Labrador. With headquarters and a coordinator in Happy Valley - Goose Bay, a network of victim services para-professionals work in each small community on an as-needed, fee-for-service basis. These part-time, community-based victim services workers receive referrals from the RCMP and other service providers, and they also take self-referrals. They are on-call and deliver the following services:

This program is not a Crown Victim/Witness Assistance program although it provides some of the same services. Victim/Witness Assistance staff travel with the court circuit providing additional service.

The delivery of the services listed above is made more crucial as several communities have only fly-in police service with few other community-based services. In the four communities with women’s shelters, these para-professionals are also often employed as shelter workers. This has allowed them greater access to, and knowledge about, the victimized women in their community.

These victim services para-professionals are supervised by the Victim Services Coordinator in Happy Valley - Goose Bay, who is, in turn, supervised by the Director, Victim Services Program, Department of Justice, Government of Newfoundland in St. John’s Newfoundland. This entire network of para-professionals gets together once a year for training, debriefing and support.

The strength and usefulness of this program (its "best practice") lies in the fact that a relatively large network of permanent community members are trained and employed to offer services to victims in their own community on a long-term basis. Service delivery is not therefore dependent on having ‘outsiders’ deliver a service for a short time before leaving, which is a common phenomenon in isolated Aboriginal communities. These victim services workers are a permanent resource in their community.

Another "best practices" feature of this program is reflected in the clear boundaries and supportive environment in which the community-based victim services para-professionals operate. They are in constant communication with the Victim Services Coordinator in Happy Valley - Goose Bay who assists them in keeping their roles clear with victims, and victims' families, through an ongoing review of the cases they are managing.

The lack of community-based services in most remote jurisdictions can easily burn out those service providers who do exist. The fact that this problem is recognized and planned for in Labrador is to the credit of the overall service.

Isuarsivik Treatment Centre, Kuujjuaq, Quebec: Inuit Addictions Treatment Centre

This treatment centre, located in the Nunavik (Inuit) region of northern Quebec, specializes in the treatment of addictions amongst Inuit Canadians. It is a ‘best practices’ example of one facet of victim services, addictions treatment, as it does not assume, as many treatment centres do, that Inuit people are from the same cultural background as First Nation and Métis Aboriginal peoples.

This program accepts only Inuit applicants and is run entirely in Inuktituk by Inuit counsellors who have received training in both western and Inuit methods of trauma recovery and intervention. The program is open to any Inuit people anywhere in Canada and is based on Inuit culture. In fact, the re-acquisition of one’s cultural heritage is treated as one of the primary pillars of addiction recovery for program participants.

The program is four weeks long and is preceded by a comprehensive application process, ensuring that the applicant is committed to their healing. The program itself uses program components from a variety of sources: cultural traditions and teachings; Alcoholics Anonymous; cognitive therapy; trauma recovery therapy; and recreational therapy. Codes of behaviour and interaction are clearly detailed.

This program is gaining respect in northern Canada and there is a waiting list to get in at this time. Those wishing to attend can be funded through their local Health and Social Services office in NWT, Nunavut, Quebec, and Newfoundland/Labrador.

Buffalo Regional Victim Services, Buffalo Narrows, Saskatchewan: Assisting Victims with the Restorative Justice Process

Many victim services programs are finding themselves in the position of preparing victimized individuals for relatively recent restorative justice procedures such as circle sentencing, family group conferencing and family justice forums. These justice initiatives, aimed at increasing the effectiveness and relevance of the justice system, are also challenging victim services programs to prepare and support victims in different ways than the traditional justice system demanded.

The Buffalo Regional Victim Services, with one paid staff person and several volunteers, serves several isolated, First Nation communities in the Buffalo Narrows region of northern Saskatchewan. Victim Services workers in this region have found that they are spending increasing amounts of time assisting victims with "family justice forums." These pre-sentence forums are designed to give both the victim and offender, and their families (including children), the opportunity to explain how they have been affected by the offence. Victim Services paid staff and volunteers assist the victim, and her family and children, in preparing for these forums. They attend the forum with them and are available for debriefing and follow-up in the days following the forum. Addictions, probation and mental health specialists, as well as a mediator, also attend all forums. The forum makes recommendations to the judge regarding sentencing.

Victim Services workers in this region (and others contacted during this research) have found that these forums, when planned and mediated properly, are very useful in returning a sense of control and power to victims. Many victims have reported to the workers that they have felt ‘heard’ and empowered for the first time in their lives. Those who had previously been victims or witnesses in the criminal court system feel the family justice forum gave them a much greater sense of dignity, empowerment and closure.

The Victim Services Coordinator in this region works co-operatively with the other community service providers in the planning, preparation, follow-up and family justice forum proceedings.

Legislation That Protects Victims
Family Violence Prevention Act: Yukon Territory

This legislation is notable and recognizable as a "best practice" in terms of victim services as it directly addresses some of the most pressing practical and psychological needs of victimized women and children. Therefore, it is included here as a best practice worthy of consideration by other jurisdictions.[34] The Yukon Territory Family Violence Prevention Act has three components: An Emergency Intervention Order; a Victim’s Assistance Order; and a Warrant of Entry. Each of these components is outlined below.

An Emergency Intervention Order:

A Victim’s Assistance Order:

A Warrant of Entry:

In intent, this legislation allows women and children to remain in their home, greatly reducing the increased strain on assaulted women and children when they are forced to leave and find shelter elsewhere. In other jurisdictions, victimized women can find it difficult, often impossible, to regain access to their home once they have left. Often the abusive partner has been successful in retaining the right to live in the home despite any charges, convictions or sentences imposed on him. The housing shortage in most remote Aboriginal jurisdictions often means that women and children are therefore forced to return and live with an abusive spouse and father, despite their desire to end the relationship.[35]

Victim Notification System, Alaska, USA: Information Access for Remote, Aboriginal Communities

Alaska, like most circumpolar regions, has several dozen remote, fly-in, Aboriginal and Inuit communities. In 1996 Alaska passed a constitutional amendment protecting victim’s rights. This "Bill of Rights for Victims" guarantees victims of crime the same rights under the law as offenders. This legislation requires that victims be given up-to-date information about their court case and the status of the offender(s) involved.

The Alaska Department of Corrections has created several victim notification systems. Victims of crime can phone a toll-free phone number 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and speak with a central data bank that tracks both court cases and the status of offenders throughout the USA. In addition they can contact, through collect phone calls, one of the 13 Victim Services offices within Alaska during business hours to access the same information. Finally, victims can also phone collect to the Victim Services Coordinator for Alaska if they need further information or clarity about their case and the offender concerned. Some indigenous languages (there are 14 in Alaska) can be accommodated within this notification system.

This system is notable as a "best practice" as it increases the sense of control for victims of crime. As this highly accessible system was created for their use alone, it decreases the feeling many victims have that their safety and rights are secondary to those of the offender. The Victim Services Coordinator for Alaska reports that the service is well used throughout Alaska.

Victim Financial Compensation, Alaska, US: Immediate Financial Aid

Another noteworthy victim service in Alaska is the streamlined system of financial compensation for victims of crime. The legislative changes which protect and support victims of crime, made during the mid-90s in Alaska, included the mandatory, immediate financial compensation to victims for personal injuries and property damages. Victims are not required to pursue their offenders, or any other party, for the financial means to rebuild their lives.

Victim Services workers assist victimized individuals and families in assessing their needs and applying for immediate financial aid. The state then pursues the offender, and any other implicated parties, for financial restitution.