Gov. Sam Brownback stressed the importance of community involvement while giving a talk and answering questions at the Kansas Union Ballroom about human trafficking Thursday night.
The U.S. Department of Justice defines human trafficking crimes as actions that “focus on the act of compelling or coercing a person’s labor, services, or commercial sex acts.”
Brownback was an original co-sponsor of the federal Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000, a bill that sparked reform of trafficking laws. The act was renewed in 2008.
However, Kansas is specifically considered a state with weaker laws, according to political science graduate student Laura Dean. We’re missing lots of things like victim service protection,” Dean said. “Many victims suffer STDs or are pregnant when they come in.”
Dean, 31, researched trafficking in Kansas and worked in a shelter for trafficking victims in Latvia. “Right now they go to half-way houses,” she said. “But there are no shelters dedicated specifically to trafficking victims.”
Brownback said he hopes lawmakers can set aside personal differences and help curb trafficking. “I think what we really need to be doing nationally as a country right now, is focusing on policies that created pools of trafficking victims,” he said.
Kansas is known to be a hub of trafficking in the United States. Dean said that Kansas’ location and economy make it a major transportation area for victims. “There’s a major highway that runs from Canada to Mexico that traffickers use,” Dean said about Interstate-35, which runs through south-eastern Kansas. “The agriculturally based economy also makes it a place for forced labor and trafficking.”
While I-35 crosses Kansas, Interstate-70 crosses the whole state horizontally – it stretches from Utah to Maryland. The two highways intersect in Kansas City, which has one of the highest numbers of trafficking arrests in the country. Brownback encouraged the audience to get involved in the issue on a global level. “Pick an area and focus on it,” he said. “…give (victims) a name and a face.”
He also said he talked to Chancellor Bernadette Gray-Little, who was in attendance, about raising money for a center of human trafficking on campus where students can earn degrees that would help them eliminate trafficking.
Brownback hopes his talk raised awareness of trafficking in the audience. “I hope they get the scope of what’s happening,” he said. “And I hope some of them were motivated.” [http://www.kansan.com/news/2012/feb/02/brownback-trafficking/]
Recognize the signs of trafficking:
www.polarisproject.org/human-trafficking/recognizing-the-signs
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