Kentucky advocates mark Domestic Violence Awareness Month, call for better accountability and sustained funding

Heather Dearing, deputy chief of staff to Lieutenant Governor Coleman and acting director of the Kentucky Commission on Women, opened a virtual discussion in October for Domestic Violence Awareness Month and cited the Commission’s recent report that "45 percent of women in Kentucky will experience ... physical violence or stalking by an intimate partner within their lifetime," a figure she said translates to more than 1 million women in the Commonwealth.

The conversation brought together commissioners and service leaders to review the state’s early role in building domestic-violence services and to identify current gaps. "We actually have a 60 bed emergency program that is full every single day," said Anne Perkins, executive director of Safe Harbor of Northeast Kentucky, describing Safe Harbor’s emergency shelter, transitional housing and a $4.5 million tax-credit project that created 34 one-, two- and three-bedroom apartments for survivors.

Retired federal magistrate Peggy Patterson traced the movement back to the late 1970s and recalled early data and policy steps that helped create a statewide response: a Lou Harris survey documenting domestic violence incidence, the creation of a $5 marriage-license fee that became trust-and-agency funds to support shelters, and state and federal partnerships. "I helped draft the legislation," Patterson said of the licensing fee approach; she estimated the trust-and-agency fund has generated about $23 million since it began.

Darlene Thomas, who runs Greenhouse 17 in the Bluegrass district, described program evolution from basic shelter operations to holistic, community-linked services. Greenhouse 17 operates on a 40-acre farm model and "reaches around 7,000 survivors a year," Thomas said, providing shelter, visitation/exchange services and social-enterprise activities aimed at economic stability.

Speakers described several modern challenges: the complexity added by substance use and mental-health needs, uneven access to health services after the overturning of Roe v. Wade, and fluctuating federal and state funding. Perkins said mandated program status under Kentucky regulations means agencies must meet state standards, but funding pressures and reduced local mental-health linkages have reduced the seamless care that advocates consider essential.

A recurring theme was accountability for people who do harm. "We have as many women dying today at the hands of their abusers as we did 40 years ago," Thomas said, arguing that current responses have not reduced the rate of fatal violence. She urged exploration of alternatives to long jail terms—intensive accountability programs with monitoring, modeled on drug- or specialty-court approaches—and said perpetrators should bear more of the financial costs of harm.

Speakers also highlighted prevention work developed in Kentucky, including the bystander-intervention Green Dot program. Thomas pointed to five years of research showing reductions in high-school violence where Green Dot interventions were used, and advocates asked for more investment in prevention rather than relying only on crisis response.

To support survivors, the panel recommended local engagement: learn about nearby programs, volunteer, donate, believe survivors and press legislators for consistent support for frontline services. Heather Dearing closed the event by thanking the guests and saying the Commission will archive the recording on its YouTube channel and continue similar conversations in the future.

The session contained no formal motions or votes; it was framed as a public-education conversation and educational outreach by the Kentucky Commission on Women.