Domestic violence stakeholders reflect on 1st year of Michigan’s address confidentiality program

Address Confidentiality Program Coordinator Karen Hall speaks at a roundtable discussion in Kalamazoo, Michigan talking about the first year of Michigan's Address Confidentiality Program on September 16, 2024 | Photo: Anna Liz Nichols

More than 200 people seeking protection from domestic and sexual violence and stalking have been enrolled in Michigan’s Address Confidentiality Program to keep their addresses safe in the last year since the program began.

Survivors of violence have been able to vote, get library cards and enroll their children in school without their addresses becoming available to their abusers, Address Confidentiality Program (ACP) Program Coordinator Karen Hall said during a roundtable discussion at YWCA Kalamazoo Monday with Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel and domestic and sexual violence care providers from around the state.

Michigan launches address confidentiality program to protect violence survivors

“To say that this program is a way for people to hide — it is not,” Hall said. “Our participants are really grateful that this program exists because some of them have been in the shadows for so long and this program really gives them an opportunity to kind of step out into the light. So it is needed, and I’m grateful to be a part of it.”

Hall announced that 215 participants have joined the ACP, including 104 children and 111 households.

The program, which allows participants to receive a designated legal mailing address to be used in lieu of their actual address , would have been a game changer in her life, YWCA Kalamazoo CEO Susan Rosas said, as she was a victim of stalking in the past.

“When it was happening, it was terrifying,” Rosas told the roundtable, recalling how when she built up the courage to report the stalker to the police, they laughed at her and she was left on her own to protect herself.

Stakeholders had the opportunity Monday to ask questions about the program and learn more about how they can spread the word about how to apply.

Forty states had some version of an ACP before Michigan, the attorney general’s office reports. But where Michigan differs is it’s one of the only programs that doesn’t require a person to have received a personal protection order (PPO), Rosas notes. Instead it requires a notarized letter in which the applicant to the program explains why they are at risk of violence.

“In many other states, one of the eligibility requirements is that you have to have a PPO, you have to have already gotten your order. You have to show a police report to demonstrate your victimization. The program is activated by somebody else saying this person is victimized,” Rosas said. “What Michigan has done, which I think is so remarkable and so important, is Michigan says ‘Your word is good enough for me.’”

The idea that registering to vote or updating a driver’s license could lead to an abuser getting access to a victim’s address is unconscionable, Nessel said, as processes of government should never be the reason a person is made to become unsafe.

Nessel noted that the ACP is a complicated program, one that requires a survivor to be somewhere in the process of moving prior to putting their new address on any government documents, in order to fully shield the new address. There are resources available on the Michigan Attorney General’s website on how the program works, as well as a database of individuals trained on how to assist in the application process.

The ACP was not an easy program to put into law and then coordinate between branches of government to create its structure, Nessel said. It took violence survivors, care providers and bipartisan elected officials several years of being vocal advocates for violence victims around the state, highlighting the importance of elected officials understanding the nuances of violence.

A concerning element about this election season, Nessel said, is one candidate, who she did not name, making comments about how women should stay in violent marriages for the sake of their kids, despite the negative health impacts of growing up around domestic violence .

Republican U.S. Sen. J.D. Vance, former President Donald Trump’s running mate, has made similar comments.

In 2021, Vance told a California high school why he thinks divorce has become more common with each generation.

“This is one of the great tricks that I think the sexual revolution pulled on the American populace, which is the idea that like, ‘well, OK, these marriages were fundamentally, you know, they were maybe even violent, but certainly they were unhappy. And so getting rid of them and making it easier for people to shift spouses like they change their underwear, that’s going to make people happier in the long term,’” Vance said. “And maybe it worked out for the moms and dads, though I’m skeptical. But it really didn’t work out for the kids of those marriages.”

Although public understanding of domestic violence is improving, Nessel said that it’s important for those who work with victims and survivors of violence to correct the record as misconceptions surrounding violence still circulate.

Michigan has outpaced some other states’ participation in its address confidentiality program, and Hall said she looks forward to increasing accessibility for participants, with the greatest challenge right now being that not many people in the state know about the program.

Individuals need to be accepted into the ACP before they go to change their address at the Secretary of State. That got Hall and Nessel thinking that there could be conversations that need to be had with the Department of State in this second year of the program about potentially adding a box on documents to alert people to the program, further ingraining access to resources for survivors.

After the roundtable, the Michigan Advance sat down with Hall, Nessel and other individuals to hear more about the impact of the ACP and state of care for survivors in Michigan.

Nessel recalled starting her career in the Wayne Prosecutor’s Office in the 1990s, often feeling restrained by her role in the legal system as many victims didn’t want to go through the trauma of being questioned by a defense attorney.

“We don’t pressure people into prosecuting anymore, and I feel like I know I used to do that because I really wanted to help and I didn’t know any other way to help people,” Nessel said. “I feel like it was openly hostile to people who really needed someone to care about them.”

A criminal conviction isn’t the only way for someone to achieve justice or move forward in life, Nessel said. And as staff in courts and other government institutions listen to survivors of violence and learn, more systems can adapt to help survivors continue their lives in safety.

“I felt like as a young prosecutor, ‘This is all I have to offer you.’ … That was it,” Nessel said. “Now what we’re really trying to do is say that’s not all we have to offer in terms of the criminal justice system or the state or all these great nonprofits that are doing all this work. We can help you with therapy. We can help you relocate. We can help you not be found by a person that really scares you.”

All many survivors want to do is “get their life back” after so much has been taken from them, Rosas said. And the ACP starts by believing victims of abuse, simply asking them to explain to the government why they need the program. Rosas says that sends a powerful message of trust and care from Michigan’s government to victims of abuse.

Gaining back that freedom to go to a public library or enroll kids in school is justice for some survivors of violence, Hall said.

“Justice looks different for everybody — and some people, they may not want to prosecute. They want to just reclaim their life and this is one way that they can do it,” Hall said. “So I think it gives people a lot of hope, those who have been kind of sitting in the background and shadows, not being able to come out of fear of them being found.

Stalking as a form of violence is particularly unnerving for victims, Nessel said, adding that she and her wife, Alanna Maguire, have been victims of several cases of stalking as a result of being in elected office. Earlier this year, a 40-year-old man was arrested on suspicion of stalking after showing up at Nessel’s home in Plymouth, ringing the doorbell and sitting on the porch after attending a meeting the day prior of the Plymouth City Commission, of which Maguire is a member.

Having to go through court to prosecute her stalkers and watching her wife experience trauma from having to testify, Nessel said she understands why people don’t want to go to court.

“If I can be attorney general and if this is this hard and it really, it does make me just want to be like, ‘You know, just forget about it, I don’t want to deal with this anymore.’ I mean, I want this man to leave us alone, but that’s all I want at this point,” Nessel said.

The process of leaving abusive and controlling situations often is the most dangerous period of abuse , members of the roundtable discussion reiterated during the conversation. And there’s a lot of planning required to safely leave a situation Christina Hayes, human trafficking program director for YWCA Kalamazoo, told the Michigan Advance . Figuring out safe housing is a top priority.

“This program has outlaid an opportunity for people to still participate in the things that they’ve always done with their address remaining confidential,” Hayes said. “I’ve been doing this work for a few years now and I think this is just a game changer. It’s a piece of a puzzle, but it opens so many doors.”

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