Hoovler: “the numbers are staggering”
GOSHEN – Orange County Government in all its branches, led by District
Attorney David Hoovler announced Thursday morning that the county will
be the first in the nation to pledge its support to the “It’s
on Us” national campaign for the prevention of sexual assault on
college campuses.
Along with the combined support of the county government, the three schools
the county is home to – Mount Saint Mary’s College, SUNY Orange
and the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, have pledged their support
to the prevention of sexual assault on campus where, according to current
statistics, one in five women, as well as one in 16 men, will become victims.
Hoovler said those statistics are unacceptable and he is proud Orange
County will be the first in the nation to officially support the “It’s
on Us” campaign.
“The numbers are staggering; in this county alone, almost half of
the victims of sexual assault are women under the age of 24,” said
Hoovler. “The victims – they’re our daughters, they’re
our sons, they’re are our employees, they’re our friends,
they may even be people in this room; that’s why we’re here.
We’re here to do everything we can to stop a sexual assault.”
The “It’s on Us” campaign began in September 2014 as
a way to encourage people not to be idle bystanders if they believe they
are witnessing a sexual crime on a college campus or anywhere else. The
premise is that, although law enforcement and government may be competent
in dealing with sexual crimes, the best way to stop sexual assaults is
to prevent them from happening in the first place.
Kristin Avery, campaign manager for “It’s on Us,” said
having Orange County join the initiative as a whole is an important development
because the best way to prevent these crimes is to have an aware, involved
community.
“I think it’s really showing that it’s really important
to have everybody in a community involved and we’re starting mainly
with communities that have colleges in them, such as this one with West
Point and Mount Saint Mary’s and SUNY Orange and that’s what
we’re going to continue to do across the country,” said Avery.
“I think when you have everybody in the community because so many
colleges are community colleges and people are out in the community every
day, it’s really important to have business leaders step up and
elected officials step up and recognize that this is an issue and also
address it comprehensively and put more resources in the sexual assault/rape
crisis centers in town and really provide resources across the community,
to help people, where they can go if something happens and to really support
survivors.”
The Orange County campuses have already begun to “step-up”
their efforts in combating sexual assaults. West Point said their Sexual
Assault/Harassment Response Prevention Program has been showing promising
results, SUNY Orange has implemented a more comprehensive sexual consent
policy taking “No Means No” to another level by maintaining
that lack of resistance, or not saying no, does not allow permission for
sexual advances and Mount Saint Mary’s has had 600 students, including
all of their freshman, this year participate in Escalation Training.
Orange County officials are encouraging all members of the community –
students, business leaders and residents to visit www.itsonus.org, or
Facebook and take the pledge provided.
