Stephanie Henrich, executive director for Casa, called into the Osceola County supervisors’ meeting to report that Casa has started a Sexual Assault Response Team (SART) for the county, involving county attorneys, the sheriff’s office and victim-witness coordinators.

Henrich said the new coordination has already resulted in additional case referrals and improved communication between advocates and law enforcement. She summarized Casa’s regional funding structure — “our fiscal year going in is, 595,000 that we are getting from, you know, the state and federal level. That’s for 19 counties,” she said — and noted $501,000 of that total is payroll. Henrich asked the county for $5,000 to support FY26/FY27 services in Osceola County, citing mileage and advocate response costs.

Henrich said the local advocate’s outreach and coordination led to new cases being reported and helped clarify the organization’s role to law enforcement. “This past year, we saw 15 survivors of sexual assault in your county. I believe it’s truly more,” she said.

Why it matters: the requested county contribution would directly cover mileage and immediate response costs associated with advocates attending medical exams, interviews and court-related support. The request will be considered during county budgeting; no formal appropriation was made at the meeting.

Speakers and attribution: all direct quotes in this article come from the transcripted remarks of Stephanie Henrich during the recorded call-in presentation (first recorded at SEG 089). When the transcript used alternate spellings for local place names, this article uses the correct local jurisdiction name as stated elsewhere in the record: Osceola County.

Next steps: supervisors acknowledged the request and thanked Henrich for the update. The funding request will be considered in upcoming budget deliberations.