Virginia Anti-Violence Project Offers Support Tailored To the Needs of the LGBTQ Community

Ash Griffith
March 20, 2018

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Read More: Equality Virginia, Flor Lopez Trejo, Ha Tran, Side by Side, Stacie Vecchietti, Virginia Anti-Violence Project

The Virginia Anti-Violence Project (VAVP) is an organization working to create a strong support system for the LGBTQ community in Virginia by striving for a world free from violence.

The VAVP came about when LGBTQ activists involved with a mainstream organization working on the problem of domestic violence realized that their community wasn’t coming to programs that were offered. Instead of just taking what was already being done and slapping an LGBTQ label on it, they decided to start from the ground up and cultivate an organization that worked to combat the problem, with specific focus on the LGBTQ community.

The VAVP began by asking what the community wanted in a support system. “What did violence look like in their lives? What did support look like in their lives? We started having conversations about what it would look like, instead of doing the work as it always has been done,” said Stacie Viecchetti, VAVP Program Director, explaining that the group wanted to “start from the beginning.”

While the group is currently a non-profit organization, they weren’t sure at the time of their establishment in 2006 whether or not to go that route. While they reviewed their options, they looked for a fiscal sponsor in order to provide funding for the group. Initially, this was Equality Virginia, but the VAVP ended up separating from that group in 2008, in order to establish their own organizational identity and apply for non-profit status. Funding has always been an issue, but in recent years it’s been steady enough that they’ve grown to a staff of four full-time and two part-time people.

VAVP works specifically for survivors of a wide spectrum of violence, including but not limited to hate violence, sexual violence, interpersonal violence, stalking, and bullying. They attempt to take a holistic approach, and the programs that they have to offer reflect that. The programs focus on wellness, taking care of yourself personally, and in specific aspects of daily life, such as relationships.

“On the second and fourth Mondays of every month, in partnership with Side By Side, we have an LGBTQ Youth of Color Group for people of color who are 14 to 20. That’s a really cool space where we’ll talk about maybe experiences of violence but a lot of healthy relationship stuff and just what it might be like particularly to be a young person of color who is in a community,” VAVP team member Ha Tran said. “Every month we have wellness days, and those look different, but it’s basically a day of the month where there’s a community conversation around a type of wellness.”

While the VAVP does have a physical office, they don’t really use it, aside from meetings. The VAVP believes in a very grassroots, hands-on approach in order to stay as connected to the LGBTQ community as possible and remain aware of their needs. They prefer to go to wherever they are needed in the community.

“We have weekly meetings here, but besides that we are all over the place. We try to go to where people are, meet them where they are, and meet them where they need us to be. We’re not the kind of place that asks people to come and have an appointment with us. We try to be there for them in the ways that they need us to be,” VAVP team member Flor López Trejo said.

VAVP’s community wellness projects teach proper self-care, including yoga, painting, and massages. Recently they hosted a community conversation about harm within the community, and how to come together as a community once violence occurs in order to create a support system and establish community accountability.

VAVP also organizes survivor retreats, including two coming up in June for LGBTQ folks who have survived violence of any kind. In December, they have a program for and by trans and non-binary individuals called the Trans Inspiration Project, which strives to uplift the resilience in the community. It also helps connect people to free resources such as name and gender marker changes and free HIV testing. Working with the Spanish-speaking community is also an important part of their mission; last fall, they organized a Language Justice Wellness Day to help ensure that Spanish interpreters translate in a manner respectful to the LGBTQ community.

Of course, the organization does encourage volunteer work, and for the community to get involved as much as they possibly can. They offer volunteer orientations, allowing everyone to have a clear understanding of their values. With the orientation as a starting point, the organization helps place volunteers where they’ll do the most good with their unique strengths and talents.

“For volunteering specifically, the roles can look really different, and for the most part we kind of find a way for people to fit,” Tran said. “We have volunteers who do graphic design for us, help us with administrative stuff, or volunteers who help us do outreach or flyering. There’s a lot of room, I think, for support for our organization. It really depends on what folks are wanting to do with us.”

It is not difficult to see that the VAVP is built of a unit of passionate, dedicated people who want to see improvements in their city. While many other organizations still cater to the same fundamental needs for survivors of violence, VAVP hopes to make a difference by giving the LGBTQ community something that is specifically for them, which caters to their specific needs.

“I want my people to know that VAVP cares about you. Everyone is seeing each other as a community, and human beings supporting each other,” López Trejo said. ”We are [providing] something for someone else. They just need spaces to be, and in community with each other.”

“I just hope that we see ourselves, and we see each other, and our liberation is all tied up together. I think sometimes it’s just hard for us to find space to talk about it,” said Viecchetti. ”So that’s what I wish for. That’s what I wish for my people.”

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