Belmont County Commissioner Vince Gianangeli, from left, Tri-County Help Center Sexual Assault Program Facilitator JaQue Galloway, Suvivor Navigator Emalee Fields, Education Advocate Misty Klug, and Commissioners Jerry Echemann, and J.P. Dutton acknowledge April to be Sexual Assault Awareness Month.

ST. CLAIRSVILLE – The Belmont County Board of Commissioners on Wednesday made sure that next month will shine a spotlight on sexual assault awareness in the county, declaring April to be Sexual Assault Awareness Month.

Tri-County Help Center Sexual Assault Program Facilitator JaQue Galloway, Community Education Advocate Misty Klug, and Suvivor Navigator Emalee Fields attended the meeting to inform the board of what the center will be doing in the month of April.

“We really appreciate the commissioners recognizing this awareness month, because sexual violence does affect millions of Americans in every community, including Belmont County,” Klug said. “Teal is the color for Sexual Assault Awareness Month. The official National Wear Teal Day is April 7.”

The center has partnered with survivors it works with, who have recommended books that have helped in their journeys of healing and empowerment. The book recommendations will be displayed in the St. Clairsville Public Library, Bellaire Public Library, Puskarich Public Library in Cadiz, and the Monroe County Public Library in Woodsfield.

“Another thing that will be happening is we have a display called ‘What were you wearing?’ These are mannequins, with each of the mannequin wearing outfits that represent the clothing that was worn by real survivors at the time of their assault,” Klug said.

“The reason this exhibit exists is because often the blame is unfairly shifted to survivors, that what they were wearing was a reason for their assault, and we want to dispel that myth of victim-blaming. So you can see the clothing that survivors were were wearing, and those will be on display at the St. Clairsville Area Chamber of Commerce,” she added. “We also have a really fun walk coming up called “Chalk the Walk” for positive impact. And this is an event that’s going to be taking place in Cadiz at Sally Buffalo Park. We’d love to do something like this in Belmont County as well. So if anybody’s listening and wants to partner for us to do an event like this, we would be open to that.”

The event will take place at 11 a.m. April 25 and will see the Harrison County Dog Pound bringing some of its dogs as well as residents bringing their own dogs. Attendees will walk through Sally Buffalo Park and will be “Chalking the Walk” with positive messages for survivors. “This might seem like a simple event, but we all know that our pets give us comfort, and that is just a very strong symbol to survivors that they are not alone and that we support them,” Klug said.” We also will be doing a social media awareness campaign. We will be posting educational information to let people know about the prevalence of sexual violence in our communities, how to support survivors, warning signs to look for, and also uplifting the voices of survivors who are really sharing their stories.”

She added that the sexual assault response team board meeting will take place April 24 at the Shadyside Community Center. That will be a “lunch and learn” meeting, where food will be provided and attendees will be educated on what to look for and what resources are available for survivors of sexual assault, domestic violence and human trafficking.

Lastly, Klug said, April 29 is “Wear Denim Day.”

According to Denimday.org, Since 1999, Peace Over Violence has run an inspiring and powerful campaign to practice solidarity and support survivors by renewing its commitment to exposing harmful behaviors and attitudes surrounding sexual violence. Denim Day is recognized on the last Wednesday in April in honor of Sexual Assault Awareness Month. The campaign began after a ruling by the Italian Supreme Court to overturn a rape conviction because the justices felt that since the victim was wearing tight jeans she must have helped the person who raped her remove them, thereby implying consent. Following the reversal, the women in the Italian Parliament came to work wearing jeans in solidarity with the victim.

“On April 29, we encourage everyone to wear denim, and then we’ll be having little signs saying ask me about our jeans. We want people to know why we were doing this, because it really is a show of support for survivors, and that clothing is never a reason for sexual assault,” Klug said. “We’re going to be doing some myth-busting and challenging some belief systems.”

Fields then spoke about her role with Tri-County as a survivor navigator.

“A big part of what I do is, as a domestic violence victim myself, I can advise on what to do, what not to do, things that have helped me, things that could help other victims,” Fields said. “With our ‘Lunch and Learn,’ anybody can come, but we’re really hoping especially people who have a little bit of power in the community come, so that they can learn how to properly speak with survivors and give them the things that they need, like resources, etc, to be able to kind of get started on healing and working through their issues.”

Fields believes it is crucial to educate parents, friends, anyone at all, who is in a circle of someone who’s been physically sexually abused, so that they are able to just be more helpful.

“You’d be surprised how many people don’t know how to respond to even being told that this happened to me. So we want to educate and help people learn how to properly respond to these things,” Fields said. “It’s definitely an important thing to myself, like I said, I’m a survivor as well, so I think it’ll make a big difference. And I’m pretty excited.”