Reaching People Who Cause Harm: Policies, Funding, and Strategies in Cook County
Building on decades of work to prevent domestic violence (DV) and uplift survivors, Michael Reese Health Trust (Michael Reese), in partnership with the VNA Foundation, embarked on a landscape scan of DV prevention focused on people who cause harm. The resulting report identifies urgent challenges as well as new opportunities for how Cook County supports survivors, interrupts cycles of harm, and keeps families safe.
We approached this work with three main goals:
Describe the current services available to people who cause harm in Cook County.
Identify external factors, like funding and policy that influence these services.
Envision a more comprehensive and coordinated landscape of services and approaches.
OUR APPROACH
From June 2024 to June 2025, Michael Reese partnered with a team of researchers led by Callie Kaplan,
MPH, of Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital to conduct the landscape scan. They took a participatory
approach, directly engaging service providers, survivors, and people who caused harm to identify strengths and challenges in our approach to design a better path forward. The project approach included developing a steering committee to inform the work, support data collection, and generate key insights and recommendations. Data was collected from focus groups and interviews with people who caused harm and
survivors, program and publicly available data sources, and a survey of Partner Abuse Intervention Program
(PAIP) providers.
WHY THIS MATTERS
- In 2024, 137 people in Illinois died from domestic violence incidents, a 14% increase from 2023 and a 140% increase from 2022.
- The Illinois Domestic Violence Hotline received 59,704 contacts in 2024, a 26% increase from 2023 and a 140% increase from 2019.
- Research shows that effective programs for people who cause harm reduce violence, but services in this area of prevention are severely under-resourced, limiting program availability and quality.
Preventing violence among people who cause harm is survivor-centered. Many survivors live with their partners and want the violence to stop. Others may be co-parenting or want to make sure their partner doesn’t hurt anyone else. Survivors often share needing help for their partners, with nowhere to turn. Providers also hear from those who cause harm themselves. Every year, hundreds of people who cause harm call into the Illinois Domestic Violence Hotline seeking help to change their behavior.
WHERE WE SHOULD GO NEXT
While the report identifies a variety of opportunities and ideas for the path forward, there are five key
recommendations. Underpinning all these recommendations is the need for additional funding.
HOW WE GET THERE
The report’s recommendations provide a roadmap for both our immediate and longer-term work to prevent
partner violence. Michael Reese will take immediate steps by investing in the following priorities:
- NEW HOTLINE LINKED TO VOLUNTARY PROGRAMMING: Explore the creation of a hotline for people who cause harm, in partnership with The Network: Advocating Against Domestic Violence, to ensure that people who cause harm who voluntarily call the current domestic violence hotline get the support they need and are connected to the right resources, including immediate support and referral to needed services.
- ADMINISTRATIVE CODE UPDATES: Support a campaign to update the Illinois administrative code to empower PAIP programs to adopt new research-backed curricula and improve data collection and outcomes tracking across the system.
- EXPLORE OPPORTUNITIES FOR SYSTEM COORDINATION: Research strategies that have been effective in other locations and explore replication of successful programs in Cook County to break down silos and ensure people get connected to the services they need.
Download the full report: Reaching People Who Cause Harm: Policies, Funding, and Strategies in Cook County
To learn more about our Prevent Domestic Violence priority and our approach to prevention—including work that engages people who cause harm, contact Jennifer Rosenkranz, Senior Program Director, Domestic Violence.