Utica College Touts SafeTrax Program

UTICA — A grant from the United States Department of Justice and partnerships with community organizations are contributing to Utica College’s new “Safe Trax” program, an endeavor to offer enhanced sexual violence prevention education and victim services to the campus community.

In a Friday announcement, college president Laura Casamento said a $298,330 grant would work to create programming such as mandatory prevention education for incoming first-year and transfer students, and hire a full-time program coordinator who will oversee and manage outreach programs that will include partnerships with local law enforcement, the YWCA of the Mohawk Valley and the Mohawk Valley Health System.

Utica College Assistant Vice President of Student Affairs and Dean of Students and Campus Life, Timothy Ecklund said the compensation package for the position might equate to about, “one-quarter to one-third of the grant. ... This is an incredible new chapter. We’re going to be able to hire a full-time staff member to do prevention work.”

The rest of the funds from the DOJ grant also will fund a partnership between the college and the YWCA of the Mohawk Valley to create and administer training programming for campus personnel and local law enforcement on how to best respond to incidents of sexual or domestic violence and stalking incidents.

“It’s a serious issue across higher education,” Ecklund said. He added that the Utica College campus is a safe campus, and the grant funds and planned programming are part of a broader effort to increase campus safety.

Congressman Anthony Brindisi, D-Utica, said the grant would be instrumental in, “making sure survivors have the resources they need.”