Travis County Commissioners Court
February 6, 2007
Item 3
Number 3. Consider and take appropriate action on the following: a, recognize February 5 through 9, 2007 as teen dating violence awareness week; b recognize the three -- read them all? Or address them one by one? Or what? Let's just read a and take it then.
>> judge Biscoe, Commissioners, I'm greg hamilton, Travis County sheriff. With me is chief jim sylvester and also with me is the community service
>> [indiscernible] kelly page. Approximately six or seven months ago we came and -- and showed you our new team dating violence video in the program, choose respect, that we are doing with the schools across the state of Texas. Mainly here in Travis County. Yesterday the congress proclaimed February 5th through the 9th the national teen dating violence awareness and prevention week. We are asking the Commissioners court to recognize this particular week as teen dating violence week.
>> move that we recognize it?
>> second.
>> by recognize it, we ask all to be aware and to take teen violence prevention actions.
>> that's correct. I don't know if you were aware, we were showcased last week with the america's most wanted, john walsh came up, we did a program over at the connally high school in Pflugerville. It aired this past Saturday. On america's most wanted.
>> we will get you a video. So we can look at -- you can look at it during your free time.
>> connally high school. Approximately 200 students in the high school, the band members there, cheerleaders there, students there, interviewed them, had a panel discussion. Showed them interacting in the hallway like a usual way. Philosophy and programs that we create here at the sheriff's office. That's great if we can make prevention of teen dating violence televised the revolution will be televised.
>> as much as I would like to take credit for it, kelly p.g.a. Is the one that made the contact, mtv was there doing a segment with america's most wanted high school.
>> fantastic, thanks so much for doing that.
>> I will be sure to share that video with the rest of the court.
>> I will make copies for each one.
>> thank you.
>> b is to recognize the three --
>> judge, we need to vote.
>> > all in favor? Enthusiastic though late unanimous court. B, recognize the three winning public service announcements created by local teens from the recent Austin film festival and Travis County sheriff's office competition; and
>> part of our program, we contacted the Austin film festival. The first one that's we used were actually created by teens in idaho. We brought that concept to Austin. We had over 40-intees into the -- entries into the competition. We had top 3, an honorable mention. What we are going to be doing with the psa sharing them with local networks and hopefully last year we aired them during the movie theaters, use them also for class discussions after they would view the psa, it would talk about right and wrong and how to handle situations better. We were real excited about that. We had a lot of sponsors for our events. Sweet leaf tea, free birds, kids were excited because they got free products. They will get passes to next we're's film festival. Also the kids will have their films shown at a teen film festival here in Austin in April. 7 to the three hose sent were from Austin -- chosen from Austin high school, honorable mention from crockett high school.
>> will we be showing these on channel 17?
>> they will be shown on channel 17. I think thad has it to show the three right now.
>> [ music playing ]
>> hey, what's up, man.
>> I found some pictures of you and your girlfriend.
>> [ music playing ] here's two more. Why didn't you call me this weekend. Hey, gina. I thought we were going to hang out. Look, gina, I saw some guys talking to you, all right. Listen to me. Listen to me. Nobody loves you like I do. All right? Listen, listen, nobody loves you like I do! You understand that. Gina!
>> there's one more.
>> [ music playing ]
>> where were you last night.
>> I was just with my friends.
>> why didn't you tell me where you were.
>> you don't have to know everything that I do. You are so controlling.
>> just told me, if you just told me, everything would have been okay.
>> get off me, don't touch me! These -- the teens themselves came up with the --
>> county concepts
>> [multiple voices]
>> yes, ma'am.
>> and the film festival has agreed to have the contest again next year. And what we are doing is that we are joining the women's adequacy project and safe place with their print campaign for next year. They have a contest that the kids design posters and so we will be utilizing the psa's and posters when we go into the schools. Part of our program is that we provided some free training for law enforcement, non-profits and schools and so we have our last training is offered after February 16th. Through our partnership, all agencies are joining in together to provide the training.
>> one of the things as far as the posters are concerned, I'm going to be working with the billboard companies and trying to get the winners of those poster contests put out on the billboard.
>> move that we recognize the three winning public service announcements.
>> second.
>> created by our students. Discussion? All in favor? That passes by unanimous vote. And 3 c is a report from an upcoming joint training between Travis County sheriff's office and Travis County human resources for county supervisors on "domestic violence: management approaches for the workplace. Training. Okay.
>> judge, before we get on that, I just wanted to add one more thing about the teen dating violence. The brochure that's we passed out were created in house. All art work donated by the sherri matthews a.d.a. Campaign. We have been going out to the local malls, high schools, doing a teen violence campaign program, also for the tax free shopping day. We partnered with Friday night lights. Film crew came out and partnered with us to do the teen dating violence program through the summer and early fall. We want to add that little pat on the back for kelly page. She was instrumental in putting that together.
>> sherri matthews did it pro gratia as far as designing that for us.
>> this is sheriff miller, he can elaborate more about the program we are getting ready to do tomorrow.
>> thank you. We are going to present a -- a powerpoint presentation from the family violence -- Texas task force on family violence. This is going to -- to cover domestic violence within the workplace. The -- the gist of the presentation is recognizing the symptoms and signs of domestic violence, what we as employers and supervisors can do to help victims of domestic violence and hopefully keep it out of the workplace. Developing safety plans and -- and things along those lines.
>> and some stats that I would like to throw at you right now is that -- that domestic violence is a security and liability concern. 94% of corporate security directors surveyed ranked domestic violence as a high security problem at their company. More than one million people reported violent assault by an intimate partner every year in the u.s. 37% of women who experienced the -- the domestic violence reported that the abuse had an impact on their work in the form of lateness, missed work, keeping a job or career promotions. In addition, more than 56% of those surveyed were aware of employees who have been affected by domestic violence. So I think that bringing the awareness to Travis County sheriff's office employees and supervisors that it will make us a more -- much more safer work lays. Work -- workplace.
>> what about bullying. Because that is mentioned on web pages. When you look at them about -- about children in the school yards and -- and then those bullies grow up to go work in the workplace. And they really don't change unless something is done to change that behavior.
>> I really believe that one of the things that we need to bring this to the forefront, quite often individuals put their head in the sand and act like there's not an issue. I think what we are doing today is -- is bringing it to the forefront and even though this is domestic violence month, we need to make 12 months domestic violence awareness.
>> right. Would bullying be included in the program or at least in the literature so that people recognize that is one way in which -- in which you kind of make it uncomfortable. Or -- for either your partner or your colleague.
>> it will come up.
>> regarding the bully issue, the sheriff's office is going to be starting the next couple of nights, the bullying ram that goes into the schools, students against violence everywhere. That's a program that we are going to be using throughout the year. We are a member with that organization. But I believe bullying as far as in the workplace does apply towards material that the decks actives will be presenting -- detectives will be presenting as well as a.p.d.
>> those are samples of what we passed out in the payroll stuffers in December. We approved them in December, passed out in January. We are also bringing a program called challenge day here to Austin. It was recognized on oprah winfrey a couple of months ago. Kelly in charge of contact with those programs.
>> basically the concept for challenge day, you go into a school and the -- the administration selects students to participate, about 100 students. Over a two kay workshop and -- two day workshop, they work with partners throughout the community, it could be people, just parents, could be people in businesses and stuff to make them realize that we all face the same challenges in life and that we all at one time experience bullying or prejudice, things like that. And so -- so part of that concept is for us to -- we are doing a survey at -- at connally high school is the school we have partnered up for this, to find out what kids are facing in the home, at school, to try to address that in October when we have the program and then they take that information after those two workshops, they will be working throughout the year to make improvements in a child's life by activities within the school and community. It's a community effort.
>> okay.
>> so if you work with a particular school, should I assume that the school district is also a partner? Yes, sir. Pflugerville high school received a grant to address some issues, they are going to be working with us as a partner on it. Mr. Garcia has been very open to having the program there. He actually saw the same program and when we brought it to his attention, he was real excited that we were interested in being involved in it.
>> what -- what grade level are you?
>> for the challenge, it's 9 through 12. So it's also levels in the high school.
>> aisd has what,
>> [indiscernible]
>> 70, 80,000 students.
>> one school may have a couple thousand.
>> connally is about 3500. My understanding from talking with the people at challenge day, the business is that what they try to do is start with the core children, then their responsibility is to basically pass it on throughout the school. And try to make a difference through the students to make that change. And so -- so it's a two-day process. Hopefully you can start at connally high school, just what we are doing for our training to teen dating violence, we are doing train the trainer because we can't do at all schools to do the training. Hopefully this will start to move throughout the Pflugerville school district.
>> one of the things about this program, it's not free. We -- it's about $8,000 and I'm working with the governor's office and also some private businesses to -- to front this.
>> start with one school.
>> yes, sir.
>> did any of y'all know whether Travis County has a zero tolerance program for this within our workforce? And within -- within the employees that we have? Do we have a -- don't you think that we need to work towards that? I mean with the county I mean if we are going to -- we have to be supportive of this, I think we ought to live it. I would think that c made me think of whether or not we had that, I mean, with Travis County. Maybe that's maybe an h.r. Question. I mean linda is out there. Linda, do we have -- do we have a 0 tolerance program for violence either in the workforce within our workforce or if we know of someone that works for us, that's having an issue with this kind of situation at home, because let's face it, I mean, most of these young people get it from home and they get it from -- you know, their peers.
>> you are correct, Commissioner Daugherty. What we do have is the employee assistance program and what we have received concerns expressed like that, excuse me, we make a referral to the employee assistance program and of course that's for an employee as well as any of the -- the spouse, children, family. We are pleased to join the sheriff's office with this initiative because we seek and support the need for us to be more focused in terms of bringing a policy to the court, in terms of -- of making sure that the workforce and promoting the fact that we do have a 0 tolerance. So, no, there's no policy. But it is a part of this effort that we will be working to get that before the court.
>> I think that's something that would be real important in Travis County to -- to put in. I mean so that people can see how serious we are, you know, with this kind of program and we all know that -- that a lot of times the -- the person, you know, that's -- you know, that being dealt, you know, these kind of blows most of the time, you know, they aren't talking to people. They are afraid to talk if it's a spouse or something like that. One of the things that I think that does happen or has the ability to happen is -- is that people in the workforce wouldn't know about it.
>> exactly.
>> [multiple voices]
>> I might talk to your friends and co-workers. If somebody comes in, pretty roughed up, we need to encourage, you know, people to say hey, you know, you need some help and somebody needs to know. So I would hope that Travis County would -- if that is an official direction that we could go, judge, I don't know what that would take, whether that would take -- a Commissioners court approval but I would be happy to work with that.
>> I would commit if you do go in that direction, Travis County sheriff's office along with Travis County human resources will develop posters that we can put in the workplace, have it out there. I really believe that it's important that we keep this on the tip of your tongue, not just do it for the month.
>> we are fortunate that h.r. Has printed up some posters that will be distributed during the training this week that will provide to -- that were provided to us from the family violence prevention fund. That's one step towards just putting it out on -- on boards, in common break room, things like that. Also at -- we agreed that we needed to put the resources on our web so that people can look at the information. And they are on private -- the private time.
>> okay.
>> it would take a specific agenda item, I think.
>> yes. Yes.
>> any -- questions just came to mind.
>> okay.
>> I can wait to answer, ask them, though.
>> yes.
>> do we have the expertise in house, we think, to -- to implement a program like this? Are we working with other experts or --
>> I think that we have it in house.
>> but we are getting -- getting information from other entities that are doing this. But would we have the expertise? We don't have to go outside and do that? Okay. Move approval of c?
>> second.
>> this just a report I -- to receive the report, I take it. Let's just give our colleagues a pat on the back. We look forward to the agenda item.
>> thank you. Anybody here from aisd? We will give them a few more minutes. If nobody comes, we will just approve the proclamation in two.
The Closed Caption log for this Commissioners Court agenda item is provided by Travis County Internet Services. Since this file is derived from the Closed Captions created during live cablecasts, there are occasional spelling and grammatical errors. This Closed Caption log is not an official record the Commissioners Court Meeting and cannot be relied on for official purposes. For official records please contact the County Clerk at (512) 854-4722.
Last Modified:
Wednesday, February 7, 2007 6:55 AM