Victims’ groups in York, Lancaster, Chester counties to receive over $2.2M in grants

York, Chester and Lancaster county organizations will receive more than $2.2 million in state and federal grants to help address the needs of crime victims, S.C. Attorney General Alan Wilson announced in a news conference Tuesday.

The grants will support victim advocates, counseling services and child therapy services, Wilson said at the York County Council chambers.

After the Sept. 18 stabbing death of Marandy Jade (Moreno) Brandon, 25, in a domestic violence incident in Rock Hill, Jada Charley, executive director of Safe Passage, a nonprofit that provides shelter and counseling to survivors of domestic violence, said it’s important for local victim advocates and law enforcement to work together.

“We’re all working toward the same goal and that is to eliminate interpersonal violence,” Charley said. “I’m trying to work myself out of a job.”

York County organizations will receive $1,512,523 in grants, benefiting Safe Passage, the Children’s Attention Home, the 16th Circuit Solicitor’s Office, Catawba Indian Nation, the city of Rock Hill, and the York County Sheriff’s Office.

Lancaster County will receive $458, 656 for Palmetto Citizens Against Sexual Assault and the Lancaster County Sheriff’s Office.

Chester County will receive $257, 783 for Chester Municipal Court and the 6th Circuit Solicitor’s Office.

Cherokee County will receive $110,175 for the Cherokee Children’s Home.

Wilson said the local organizations receiving grants are critical to providing support to victims of crime. And to victims, he had one message.

“Know that you are not alone,” Wilson said. “You have prosecutors that are fighting on your behalf. You have cops who are fighting on your behalf; you have victims advocates. Look at this army of people standing up here today. You are not alone.”

Debra Eident, executive director of the Children’s Attention Home, said the money will help her Rock Hill-based organization provide shelter and food for children who have been abused or neglected.

“All of those dollars are key,” Eident said. “We’re in a time where dollars are harder and harder to come by and to be able to get these dollars for these precious children who need it desperately – they really are victims of what their parents have done. They're with us through no fault of their own.”

The Attorney General’s Office is distributing more than $38 million in grants to victims’ services groups throughout South Carolina.

The S.C. General Assembly voted to consolidate victims services under the Attorney General’s Office starting July 1 through the South Carolina Crime Victim Services Act.

Burke Fitzpatrick, director of the Division of Crime Victim Services, said the change put the offices “all together where we should be.”

The grants – Victims of Crime Act grants, Violence Against Women Act grants and State Victim Assistance Program grants – are primarily funded through fines and fees collected from criminals – not from taxpayers, Fitzpatrick said.

“The message here is that the bad guys are paying the good guys for all these grant funds,” he said.

This story was originally published September 26, 2017 at 5:02 PM with the headline "Victims’ groups in York, Lancaster, Chester counties to receive over $2.2M in grants."