History
Project Impact incorporated as a non-profit, Public-Benefit Corporation in Oregon on May 16, 2006. Project Impact was developed by Executive Director, David Victor. The company has its headquarters in Eugene, Oregon and is located on the corner of 14th and High Street. This location was chosen due to its central location in Eugene, close proximity to the University of Oregon, government offices, and media agencies. Eugene is also centrally located to other cities in Oregon. The Eugene television market (DMA) includes households in seven counties: Lane, Coos, Douglas, Lincoln, Linn, Benton, and Deschutes and is the second largest media market in Oregon.
Mr. Victor has 18-years of professional experience providing sexual assault prevention strategies and services to individuals, families, groups, organizations and agencies. Mr. Victor began his work in the late 80's as a Child Assault Prevention Facilitator and Coordinator for the Shasta County Women's Refuge in Redding California. While at Shasta County Women's Refuge he received over 240 hours of training on the dynamics of Child, Domestic, Ritual and Sexual Abuse. After five years as a Child Assault Prevention Coordination, Mr. Victor moved to the Bay Area of California and worked as a group home counselor that provided secured-residential treatment for juvenile sexual offenders.
Mr. Victor then moved to Eugene to complete his education at the University of Oregon. While attending the University of Oregon Mr. Victor was a research assistant for the Oregon Twins Project, volunteered as a Mentor for Committed Partners for Youth, was involved in the Men Against Rape group, completed an honors thesis on perceived parental acceptance vs. rejection in adult male sexual offenders. He received over 1000 hrs. of a clinically supervised internship at Lane County Mental Health: Sex Offender Treatment Program (LCSOTP).
After graduation, Mr. Victor was hired as a Mental Health Specialist for LCSOTP and worked in this capacity for 10-years (1995-2005). In those 10-years Mr. Victor attained a solid base of knowledge about the psychology and treatment of sex offenders. Mr. Victor continuously seeks out the most recent research and intensive training in the field of sex offender treatment in order to enhance and update his skills, as well as finding ways to contribute his own knowledge and support to the field. Over his career Mr. Victor has come to a greater understanding of the dynamics and intricacies of this challenging work.
From 2003 - 2005 Mr. Victor split his time between the LCSOTP and Lane County Parole and Probation where he was responsible for: improving sex offender data systems to facilitate improved sex offender management, decreased waiting time for high risk offenders to enter treatment, increased the monitoring of sex offenders who had been referred to treatment but had not been admitted, and increased positive outcomes for sex offenders and victims of sexual abuse through increasing collaboration efforts among key system players. Mr. Victor also formalized and developed the current policies and standards for approving sex offender treatment providers in Lane County. Mr. Victor resigned from Lane County in 1995 and set out to provide perpetrator prevention services that have been identified as current service delivery gaps for the prevention of sexual abuse in our community.
Project Impact views sexual abuse as a public health epidemic and thus believes in advancing a Public Health Model of prevention to solve this long standing silent epidemic. We believe strongly that more can be done to prevent sexual violence before there is a victim to treat or an offender to prosecute.
Project Impact is based on the premise that people who are concerned about their own or someone else's behavior will come forward to seek out preventative information and services if they are aware that they exist. We are keenly aware that sexual offending is usually kept secret. Offenders often deny or minimize their deviance, even to themselves; they are reluctant to reveal their status and deviance to others. At Project Impact, we want to create platforms through which individuals, families, organizations, or agencies who suspect someone of having a sexual behavior problem can access information and prevention services. Our ads attempt to reach out to adults who are in high risk situations and provide them with information on the warning signs of abusive behavior, and give them resources on how to get help emphasizing that treatment is available and works in preventing future sexually abusive behavior.
We believe that individuals should be accountable for their actions and take personal responsibility for getting themselves the most appropriate services they need in order to break the cycle of abuse. It is our belief that society is heading down a very dangerous road if we continue to minimize, the severity of this problem and believe that we can simply punish are way to a society free from sexual abuse. At Project Impact we believe that as a society we can't begin to have responsible discussions about effective solutions to this multi-faceted issue until as a society we have the courage to face the fact that it is people we know, trust and care about (family members, relatives, friends, neighbors, and acquaintances), who sexually offend - not monsters.
If you still don't believe there is a need for change - look at these stats.
- One in four girls before the age of 18 will be sexually abused.
- One in six to 10 boys before the age of 18 will be sexually abused.
- One in six adult women in Oregon has been victims of sexual abuse.
- Youth's 12-17are two to three times more likely to be sexually assaulted than adults.
- More than 90% of people with developmental disabilities will experience sexual violence at some point in their lives. Only 3% of those involving people with developmental disabilities will ever be reported.
- 82-90% of all sexual assault victims knew the perpetrator and classified them as an acquaintance, a friend, intimate partner or relative.
- 88% of all sexual abuses are never reported to law enforcement.
- Only 20-30% of all sexual abuses that are reported to law enforcement end in a successful prosecution of the perpetrator.
- Only 5-10% of all newly committed sexual offenses are perpetrated by a registered sex offender. Therefore, 90-95% of all new sexual offenses are committed by citizens without a sexual offense criminal history.
- It has been estimated that a third of all registered sexual offenders have falsified information about their whereabouts.
- The National Institute of Justice estimates that rape and other sexual assaults cause an annual minimum loss of 127 billion dollars, or about $508 per U.S. resident.
- The average cost associated with investigation, prosecution, incarceration, and supervision of just one sexual offender cost $150,000.
- Early detection, intervention, and accountability, with specialized treatment and a long-term support system for the person with abusive behaviors can help people who are at risk of sexually abusing to control his or her impulses.