Macomb Community Domestic Violence Council

Our Work

Healthcare

In 2015, the Macomb Community Domestic Violence Council and the Department of Medical Education at McLaren Macomb launched an innovative approach to teaching medical residents how to talk with patients about domestic and sexual violence. For three years, all first year residents at McLaren Macomb were pretested on the PREMIS tool, a standardized and validated measure of physician knowledge and readiness on this topic. After five hours of training, the first year residents were tested again. The results were analyzed by an independent third-party data analyst.

Based on these pre-post data sets, two sets of one year post scores and one control group data set, we can confidently say that while all residents have the same internal sense of preparation and come across survivors at the same rate regardless of training, those who receive the training have the correct knowledge and behaviors.

For example:

· The rate of screening increased from 40% to 80%, and stayed at that rate one year post training, whereas the control group screened at a rate of 65%.

· The average knowledge rating increased .7 to .81 and stayed there, whereas the control group scored .7 in line with the pre test score.

Improvements were observed among trainees along all four PREMIS dimensions (preparedness, knowledge, screening, and identification) immediately following training. Each of these gains were maintained at one year follow up. When compared to a group of residents who had not received the training, trainees demonstrated greater knowledge of IPV, and higher rates of screening.

Macomb Community College

The MCDVC partners with The Macomb Multicultural International Initiatives at Macomb Community College to bring a Respond, Prevent, Connect approach to MCC. For our fall 2018 - spring 2019 seminar dates and descriptions, click here.

Respond
In 2010, we began seminars on Recognizing and Responding to Domestic Violence. Since then, nearly 400 people have become Domestic Violence Peer Ambassadors who serve as a safe contact for survivors or their loved ones to obtain basic information and referrals for services. Additionally, they share information about domestic violence with those around them.

Prevent
In Organizing to Prevent Domestic and Sexula Violence, we offer the opportunity to learn how community organizing tactics can promote healthy relationships and prevent domestic and sexual violence.
The Healthy Relationships, Healthy Communities seminar offers participants the skills to have healthy, safe and fair relationships in our personal and professional lives; and how we create communities that support them. Participants are able to identify and practice healthy relationship skills such as negotiation and conflict management.
In our Consent workship we examine the concept of consent together through practical examples and skill development. Participants can expect to deepen their own knowledge of consent and walk away with strategies to better practice consent in their own lives.

Connect
In an organizing workshop, students connect with each other and MCC faculty/staff to develop a plan of action to promote healthy relationships and prevent domestic/sexual violence.

Additionally, the MCDVC works with the Title IX and student success programs to advance survivor centered responses and programming on campus.

MI Network

From 2011 - 2018, the MCDVC served as a Founding Organizer of the Michigan Network of Bi, Trans, Lesbian, Gay and Queer Survivors of Abuse. The MI Network created community and organizational change to respond to abuse and promote healthy relationships in LGBTQ communities. Affirmations, HAVEN, Equality Michigan and Turning Point are the other founding organizers of the MI Network. For more information about how we did our work, click here.

We RESPONDED to abuse through providing training and technical assistance to domestic and sexual violence organizations on LGBTQ abuse. Additionally, we engage LGBTQ communities in discussions around community accountability and responses to survivors.

We PREVENTED abuse by facilitating Relationship Skills Classes for LGBTQ communities.

We CONNECTED people who share these values and goals with each other through the MI Network Roundtable, a group of service providers dedicated to learning more about LGBTQ abuse.

Safe & Together Implementation Committee of the HSCB

The Safe &Together Implementation Committee of the HSCB is a countywide initiative to improve the safety and well being of families. The Macomb Human Services Coordinating Body sponsors the work of this committee.

The Safe & Together Model, created by David Mandel is a survivor-centered, offender-focused response to domestic violence. This model helps cross-system collaboration by keeping the focus on the domestic violence perpetrator through language and documentation. Workers partner with domestic violence survivors to create a more effective and efficient child-centered safety plan by looking comprehensively at the survivor's day to day efforts to promote the safety and well being of the children.

In 2018, the committee coordinated four trainings on the Safe & Together model for professionals responding to domestic violence sponsored by the Human Services Coordinating Body with the financial support of the Macomb County Prosecuting Attorney's Office and the Macomb County Health Department. In 2019, this committee will continue to develop implementation tools so that we can all effectively use this approach to respond to domestic violence.

Macomb County Strangulation Response Team

Domestic violence strangulation is a unique intersection of significant harm to survivors and an opportunity for community engagement. The medical evidence of the seriousness of non-fatal strangulation compels us to find ways to utilize the existing felony domestic violence strangulation law to hold offenders accountable while connecting survivors to services. To meet this need, the Macomb County Strangulation Response Team (MCSRT) began in 2017. Our team includes the Macomb County Prosecuting Attorney's Office, Centerline Police Department, Clinton Township Police Department, the Macomb County Sheriff's Office, Turning Point forensic nurses, advocates, & survivors and the Macomb Community Domestic Violence Council. We meet monthly to provide a coordinated community response to survivors of IPV non-fatal strangulation in Macomb County including forensic strangulation assessments, medical referrals, advocacy, investigation and prosecution. During FY18, this team supported 64 survivors of non-fatal strangulation.

Reports and Protocols

The Macomb Community Domestic Violence Council recommends Batterer Intervention Programs as the only appropriate intervention for batterers. These programs should have a minimum of 26 sessions and comply with the Michigan State Standards for Batterer's Intervention. Since 2008 we have released an annual list of Batterer Intervention Programs working in Macomb County.

Download the List

The Domestic Violence Fatality Review was generated by a sub-committee of the Macomb Community Domestic Violence Council in 2006. The team was composed of a diverse coalition of representatives from the medical, criminal justice and victim services communities. Over the course of eighteen months, the multidisciplinary group examined five lethal and near-lethal domestic violence cases in our community. An independent facilitator guided the monthly discussions in order to generate consensus around the prevention techniques and system changes necessary to improve our coordinated community response to domestic violence.

The final report includes important insights regarding risk, intervention and prevention efforts that can be made by all of us in domestic violence cases. The Macomb Community Domestic Violence Council continues to facilitate the community dialogue and actions to implement and evaluate the recommendations developed by the Fatality Review Team.

Download the Report

In 2009, a small group of MCDVC members began with a vision based on the belief that we can end domestic violence, not just respond to it, if we have a plan created by the whole community. After six months of careful planning, over 125 Macomb County residents and professionals from criminal justice, education, healthcare, social services, government and the general community gathered to learn about domestic violence prevention science and build a prevention plan to end domestic violence in Macomb County.

Download the Report

The Model Domestic Violence Protocol for Law Enforcement was compiled in 2008 - 2009 by a taskforce of the MCDVC that included participation and partnership of most law enforcement agencies in the county. The Law Enforcement Taskforce of the MCDVC reviewed and revised the existing domestic violence protocols that were created nearly fifteen years prior. This new document pulls on the best practices from across the nation, the State of Michigan’s model policy, and conversations with law enforcement here in Macomb County.

This document has been endorsed by the Macomb Chiefs of Police Association, implemented in several departments and a there has been a multidisciplinary train-the-trainer training to facilitate further implementation of this policy.

Download the Report

About Us

What does the Macomb Community Domestic Violence Council do?

At the MCDVC, we believe in giving people the tools they need to create healthy, safe and fair relationships within their circle of friends, family and co-workers. We use meetings, trainings, and workgroups to create a coordinated community response to domestic violence and to offer opportunities for professional discourse and networking.

Our Mission is to develop and sustain a coordinated, broad based community response to domestic violence, to use all available community resources to eliminate domestic violence, and to support a comprehensive network of direct interventions and services for victims.

Become a Member

Our Team

Carmen Wargel
Chair of MCDVC

Carmen Wargel

Carmen Wargel, LMSW is a community organizer and educator on the topic of domestic and sexual violence. She has engaged in education and conversation related to domestic violence and sexual assault with over 4000 people since 2006 on topics such as Recognizing and Responding to Domestic Violence, Healthy Relationships/Healthy Communities, Healthcare Responses to Domestic and Sexual Violence, Consent, Understanding LGBT Abuse and more. Ms. Wargel serves the chair of the Macomb Community Domestic Violence Council, a multidisciplinary organization in Macomb County that seeks to promote healthy relationships through community, conversation, and education. She is a founding organizer of the Michigan Network of Bi, Trans, Lesbian, Gay and Queer Survivors of Abuse and co-chair of the Royal Oak School District Health Advisory Board. She serves on the boards of Mothering Justice and the Michigan Coalition to End Domestic and Sexual Violence.

For a selected list of Carmen's presentations, click here.

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Judge Joseph Oster
President

Judge Joseph Oster

The Honorable Joseph Craigen Oster was elected to the 40th District Court in St. Clair Shores, Michigan in November 1996 and reelected in 2002 and 2008. He received an A.B. in History from the University of Michigan in 1986 and his law degree from the University of Detroit School of Law in 1992.

Judge Oster served on the inaugural Macomb County Domestic Violence Fatality Review team. He received the 2007 Tracy Minnella award for his work and leadership on domestic violence issues. Currently he serves as the president of the Macomb Community Domestic Violence Council. He wrote the article “Stop the Blaming: Rethinking Responsibility in Domestic Violence Cases” which appeared in May 2012 in the State Bar of Michigan’s Family Law Journal.

Judge Oster is a member of the Macomb County Community Corrections and Baker College Paralegal advisory boards. In addition, he is the chair of the Shores Network for Action and Prevention (SNAP) coalition. The judge, currently the chief judge of the 40th District Court, is the recent past president of the Macomb District Judges Association.

Anne Bicego
Treasurer

Anne Bicego

Anne Bicego, MA LPC has been active with the Macomb Community Domestic Violence Council since 2006. Anne participated in "A Day to End Domestic Violence: The Macomb County Prevention Summit" in 2009 and helped with the coordination of the regional training "LGBT Survivors of Domestic Violence" in 2012. Anne served on Turning Point's Survivor Speakers Bureau, providing a survivor's perspective during seminars on "Recognizing and Responding to Domestic Violence" beginning in 2010. In 2014, Anne was honored to receive from the Council the Tracy Minnella Award for hHR work in support of survivors and victims of domestic violence.

Currently, Anne is raising three daughters as activists in the movement to end domestic and sexual violence, and is the Associate Operations Manager for Children's Services at Northeast Guidance Center, serving Community Mental Health consumers in Macomb and Wayne counties. Anne is pleased to have been elected as Treasurer for the MCDVC.

Dr. Linda Bajdo
Board Member

Linda Bajdo

Linda Bajdo has been involved with the Macomb Community Domestic Violence Council since 2009 and is currently the Prevention Chair. She is a psychology professor at Macomb Community College.

Steve Candela
Board Member

Steve Candela

Steve Candela received his Masters in Social Work from Wayne State University in 1984. He has been certified by the Academy of Certified Social Workers (ACSW) since 1986, and holds certification from the Michigan Certification Board of Addiction Professionals as a certified addictions counselor and clinical supervisor. He was program manager at Sacred Heart Rehabilitation Center for two years, although has spent his career servicing the patients and families of Eastwood Clinics and St. John Providence Health System since 1983. As a clinician, he has provided individual and group psychotherapy with adults and families, specializing in addiction/recovery and domestic violence behaviors. He is currently Director of Eastwood Clinics, he has developed and led numerous outpatient and residential clinics, and has expanded Eastwood Clinics (the outpatient behavioral health product line of St. John Providence Health System) to become the largest behavioral health system in southeast Michigan with ten outpatient clinics in four counties, employing over 230 behavioral health clinicians.

Macomb Community Domestic Violence Council

Healthy Relationships Matter

Healthy Relationships Begin With YOU!

Respond

Prevent

Connect

We serve as a diverse, inclusive organization to promote a culture of healthy, equitable relationships through education, conversation, and community.

Upcoming Events

Recognizing and Responding to Domestic Violence

MCDVC meeting

Organizing to Prevent Domestic and Sexual Violence

Our Work

Healthcare

Macomb Community College

MI Network

Safe & Together Implementation Committee of the HSCB

Macomb County Strangulation Response Team

Reports and Protocols

"One of the best trainings to improve professional identity and competence. [It] created the sense of empowerment to make ethical decisions for the wellbeing of clients."

About Us

Our Team

Carmen Wargel
Chair of MCDVC

Judge Joseph Oster
President

Anne Bicego
Treasurer

Dr. Linda Bajdo
Board Member

Steve Candela
Board Member

Contact Us

Macomb Community Domestic Violence Council

Healthy Relationships Matter

Healthy Relationships Begin With YOU!

Respond

Prevent

Connect

We serve as a diverse, inclusive organization to promote a culture of healthy, equitable relationships through education, conversation, and community.

Upcoming Events

Recognizing and Responding to Domestic Violence

MCDVC meeting

Organizing to Prevent Domestic and Sexual Violence

Our Work

Healthcare

Macomb Community College

MI Network

Safe & Together Implementation Committee of the HSCB

Macomb County Strangulation Response Team

Reports and Protocols

"One of the best trainings to improve professional identity and competence. [It] created the sense of empowerment to make ethical decisions for the wellbeing of clients."

About Us

Our Team

Carmen Wargel Chair of MCDVC

Judge Joseph Oster President

Anne Bicego Treasurer

Dr. Linda Bajdo Board Member

Steve Candela Board Member

Contact Us

Carmen Wargel
Chair of MCDVC

Judge Joseph Oster
President

Anne Bicego
Treasurer

Dr. Linda Bajdo
Board Member

Steve Candela
Board Member