Cultural Considerations in Assisting Hispanic Victims of Human Trafficking Presented by:

Presentation Overview  About Centro La Familia Advocacy Services Inc.  Education Tool: Human Trafficking Telenovela  A Profile on the Hispanic Population in our Community  Understanding Cultural Competency  Centro La Familia Advocacy Services’ Best Practices  Questions & Answers

About Centro La Familia Advocacy Services, Inc.  History: Founded in 1972  Mission: To empower low-income people to access life sustaining resources.  Services :  Victim Advocacy: assistance to non-citizen victims, advocacy and resource for sexual assault, human trafficking, domestic violence  Health and Wellness: health insurance enrollment, mental health, counseling, telecommunications, lead-paint hazard reduction  Family strengthening: parent education, policy and leadership development  8,000 families served agency-wide; 2,000 requests for victim services.

Video to be inserted here Education Tool: Human Trafficking Telenovela

Telenovelas and Fotonovelas  Valued and familiar tools used among Hispanic communities.  Tools reflect the culture and language of the community; this helps to increase language access to education and awareness campaigns.  Telenovela or Video Story deliver public service announcements (PSA) broadcasted on local Spanish language television to reach large Spanish speaking audiences.  Fotonovela or Storybook use visual images such as photos, in addition to text, to clearly convey the message.

A Profile on the Hispanic Population in our Community Fresno County:  51.6% of the population are Hispanic  36.25% of the urban hub are Hispanic  31.5 % of residents primarily speak Spanish  % impoverished? CLFA’s Client Makeup:  90% of clients are Hispanic  90% of clients have limited English language ability  35% of clients reside in rural communities  % impoverished?  % victims of HT served?

Understanding Cultural Competency

What is Cultural Competency?  Often used as a broad term  Can you truly be culturally competent?  Start by:  Recognizing and being aware of one’s own biases and prejudices in order to eliminate assumptions so that you can create stronger relationships with victims.  Considering each victim’s unique perspective and experiences.  Respecting and acknowledging that everyone is different.

What cultural competency means for CLFA’s work with the Hispanic Community  CLFA’s organizational framework: Understand and be sensitive to the cultural nuances of the Hispanic community and continuously evolve in our approaches to meet the diverse needs of those individuals and families we serve.  Hispanics base their interactions on the cultural traditions and important values such as family unity, religious beliefs, and family privacy.  Relationships and trust provide the foundation for serving the Hispanic community.

Centro La Familia Advocacy Services’ Best Practices

CLFA’s key approaches to providing culturally competent services to the Hispanic community  Having bilingual and bi-cultural staff.  Building trusting relationships with the community.  Developing services, outreach, and education tools that are relevant and responsive to the specific needs of the groups being served.

Bilingual and Bi-cultural Staff  Promotoras or Cultural Brokers: bilingual and bi-cultural staff who conduct outreach at the grass-roots level and serve as an important linkage in reaching the underserved community.  Staff acknowledges and respects the victim’s interpretations of her/his culture; staff become more informed to effectively navigate the power structures, connections, and support systems of the victim’s community.  Staff listen to and build upon the strengths of the victims and survivors.  Staff continually learn from one-on-one relationships with victims; staff enhance skills that enables them to be more responsive to the diverse needs of victims. Example:(Angelica’s example) A staff member has an experience learning about the decision-making dynamics within El Salvadorian families; married women defer decisions to their husbands. From this learning, staff become mindful of the approaches they must adapt to each victim’s situation.

Building Trusting Relationships With the Community  As a trusted messenger, deliver services in a manner that is consistent and maintains a high standard of credibility in the community.  Respect and accept the different set of values, cultures, and norms of a community without imposing your own.  Maintain a consistent presence in important and relevant events in the Hispanic community.  Example: Lack of transportation is a barrier to rural residents. Therefore, CLFA sets up “roving” advocacy services and maintain an out-stationed site schedule, providing ongoing support to victims in rural areas such as Coalinga and Sanger.

Developing services, outreach, and education tools that are relevant and responsive to the specific needs of the groups being served  Services: Support victim’s decisions that are often influenced by cultural values, norms, and traditions such as saving face, gender roles and not harming the family reputation.  Example: [any real example to fill in?] Human trafficking victim who faced sex trafficking might not decide to move back with family in country of origin.  Outreach and education tools: Linguistically and culturally relevant and used to supplement rather than replace communications between the agency and client. (fotonoveles, telnoveles, brochures)  Educational event planning: involves careful consideration of clients’ barriers such as availability, transportation, and language access needs.  Example: CLFA organized a domestic violence educational forum in October 2014, held at Manchester Mall Center, delivered in both English and Spanish.

Conclusion  Cultural competency is a broad term that is not achieved by following one easy formula.  Translating all materials into various languages is not the way to achieve cultural competency.  Not only is having bilingual and bi-cultural staff important, but ongoing learning from victims is equally important to enhancing services.  Building trusting relationships in the community is critical to identifying victims of human trafficking and other serious crimes.  Developing and effectively implementing culturally specific services, supplemented with outreach and education tools is important in sustaining long-term trusting relationships with clients.  Respect and learn from clients; they all have unique cultural values that will shape how you serve them.

Questions & Answers

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