Stronger Together: Collaborative Advocacy Between Systems-Based and Community-Based Advocates
When funding shrinks and caseloads grow, survivors don’t stop needing support — but the gaps between the advocates serving them can widen. This training brings together two lifelong advocates who built a partnership across systems and community lines in a rural community where resources were never guaranteed and collaboration wasn’t optional — it was the only way to serve victims well.
Drawing on years of shared casework, they’ll walk through what it actually looks like to coordinate across roles, navigate turf and trust, and center survivors’ needs when neither side has enough on its own. Participants will explore how to build and sustain working relationships between prosecution-based victim advocates and community-based organizations, share resources without duplicating or competing, communicate across different professional cultures and mandates, and show up for survivors as a united front — even when your funding sources, reporting structures, and institutional pressures look nothing alike.
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Speakers
Sharon Reed has worked in the Criminal Justice field for over thirty years in many capacities. Her roles have included correctional officer, police officer, crimes against children detective, criminal justice instructor, victim witness director, and currently a DCJS grant monitor.
She served as the Washington County Virginia Victim Witness Director for approximately 13 years. During that time, her program was recognized by the Virginia Victims Fund and the Virginia House and Senate in 2014.
Sharon instructs across the state of Virginia on victims’ rights, domestic violence, basic advocacy, and collaboration regarding victim services and working with community partners.
Sharon lives and works remotely from her home in Abingdon, VA with her wonderful son, Richmond and her two office mates (fur babies) Teeny and Miracle.
Judy Clark is a Family Services Specialist in Adult Protective Services with the Washington County Department of Social Services. She has a BA in Criminal Justice from Bluefield University. Judy is a certified Sexual Assault Advocate and a Nationally Accredited Victim’s Advocate.
She was a community-based advocate for over a decade providing direct services to victims and survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault through crisis intervention and personal advocacy in civil and criminal court proceedings. In her current role, Judy investigates allegations of abuse, neglect, and exploitation of vulnerable and elderly people. She also provides services to improve the lives of these individuals while ensuring their safety and dignity.
Judy is the Co-Chair of the Washington County and City of Bristol, VA Domestic Violence Coordinated Community Response Team (CCRT), Coordinator for the region’s Vulnerable Adult Multi-disciplinary Team (VAM), and a member of the Southwest Virginia Elder Justice Task Force. She is part of the Region 4 Department of Criminal Justice Crisis Response Team (CRT) and the NOVA National Crisis Response Team to provide crisis intervention, education and emotional first aid in the aftermath of a critical incident, either small-scale or mass-casualty. For eight years, Judy was part of a team of professionals trained by the National Clearinghouse on Abuse in Later Life to provide education to law enforcement officers geared specifically toward victims of violence over the age of 50 across the state.
In 2018, Judy received the Outstanding Community Service Award from Emory & Henry College for her participation and collaboration on the Office on Violence Against Women’s Campus Initiative.
She was honored to be one of the recipients of the 2023 Virginia Attorney General Office’s Unsung Hero Award recognizing Virginians who provide exemplary service and support to victims of crime in Virginia.