DC Archives | Stop Street Harassment

Survey Results about Sexual Harassment on DC-Area Metro

April 11, 2018 By HKearl

For six years, we’ve been collaborating with the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority and Collective Action for Safe Spaces on an anti-harassment transit campaign in the D.C. area.

Today for International Anti-Street Harassment Week, we’ll do flyering during the evening rush hour at five Metro stations to raise awareness about the issue and the campaign.

Also, WMATA released the findings from our latest joint, representative and statistically significant survey of transit riders, a follow-up to the 2016 survey. To date, WMATA is the only transit system in the country to put these kinds of resources into this kind of survey that focuses solely on sexual harassment (as well as to dedicate resources and staff time to an annual flyering day). Here are some of the findings, which show that the PSAs up on our system are having an impact!

Survey Highlights:

In 2018, persons who experienced sexual harassment on Metro were more likely to report the incident (50%) versus 2016 (33%).
Forty-seven percent of Metro customers are familiar with the anti-harassment education campaign, up from 41 percent two years ago.
Those reporting familiarity with the campaign were three times as likely to report their harassment experience than those unaware of the campaign, a 50% increase over 2016.
Verbal forms of harassment are the most common form experienced by Metro customers (64%).Â
Sexual harassment on public transportation in the region (21%) is comparable to that in the nation (17%).

In addition, the 2018 survey also looked at the reasons why some victims and witnesses do not report harassment. Some of the main reasons cited were that victims were unsure if anything could be done, did not consider the offense serious enough or just wanted to escape the situation.

More findings.

2018 Plans for DC-Area Anti-Harassment Transit Efforts

January 9, 2018 By HKearl

*WMATA, CASS and SSH Staff at a 2018 planning meeting*

It’s been nearly six years since we started working with Collective Action for Safe Spaces (CASS) and the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority on efforts to address and prevent sexual harassment on the transit system. Today, Chantal from CASS and I attended a 2018 planning meeting at WMATA HQ and we are looking forward to various forthcoming projects:

1) Audio announcements letting people know how to report harassment they experience or witness will start being played on Metro trains this month and on buses in the spring. They asked if one of us would record them and I ended up being the one who did. So if you’re in the area, listen for my voice on Metro!!

2) During International Anti-Street Harassment Week (April 8-14), we will partner together for our annual outreach day at various Metro stations. We’ll have new flyers, bracelets, and perhaps other giveaways, so stay tuned. We’ll also be looking for volunteers to help distribute information (date TBD but likely during evening rush hour on April 10 or 11).

3) Currently the third wave of print PSAs are up on the system. They are gorgeous! But if they’re up too long, people get used to them and don’t notice them anymore. They went up in Nov 2016, so it’s about time for new ads. We will work on a new set of ads over the summer.

4) We began a discussion about doing a follow-up survey of some kind to the 2016 ridership survey on sexual harassment to see how the latest print ads have been received and to see if people’s experiences with harassment have changed at all.

Those were the main updates. We are grateful that WMATA continues to dedicate time and resources to making the transit system safer.

Making History at the Women’s March on Washington

January 21, 2017 By HKearl

Around 500,000 women and male allies marched in Washington, D.C. today — and 3 million marched around the world.

We know so many of you were part of that number and we thank you for showing up and taking a stand!! We had board members marching in Washington, D.C. but also in Los Angeles and Minneapolis, too.

In Washington, D.C., due to the massive crowd size, many of us who wanted to march together never found each other, but we had a small but mighty contingent. A big highlight was when our youngest marcher Susie — my cousin’s five-year-old daughter — got to meet her hero Katy Perry, who was marching by us. She got to say hi to Katy who graciously chatted with her for a minute and told her this was her first march, too. Susie handed her one of the Stop Street Harassment stickers!

Overall, it was incredible to see the range of diversity of people there, to hear how far people had come to be there, and to witness so much kindness. Everywhere we went it was so so crowded but no one was pushy, mean or aggressive. Everyone helped everyone. All of the Metro staff and police officers we encountered were kind and encouraging and we thanked them as we went by. On the metro, there was continuing rounds of cheering and chants and we marched and chanted as we slowly moved through lines to get above ground. I was also excited to see our anti-harassment Metro ads at the four different Metro stations I used!! Yes!!

Thank you so so much to everyone who came out. Now we have to keep up the momentum and hold our elected officials accountable, run for political office, stand up to bullies and hate, and be kind to one another.

Requests for Anti-Street Harassment Art Proposal in D.C.

March 31, 2016 By HKearl

Not only is Washington, D.C. poised to become the first U.S. city with a taskforce on street harassment and the first American transit system to issue a specific survey to riders just on sexual harassment (the results will be released in April), but now they are the first U.S. city to have a grant for an art project on street harassment!

This week the DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities, the District Department of Transportation’s (DDOT) Vision Zero Initiative, and Age-Friendly DC partnered to issue a call to DC artists and designers to propose a “Zero Street Harassment Project.” The project budget is $41,000, and submissions are due by April 28, 2016, at 5 p.m.

Earlier this month, SSH and Collective Action for Safe Spaces met with staff to educate them about street harassment. CASS will be applying for the grant, but as SSH is not, I helped review the call for proposals and will serve on the committee to review the proposals.

This is so exciting!!! Here is the full grant information.

Way to go Washington, D.C.!!

Will D.C. Become the First U.S. City to have a Taskforce on Street Harassment?

March 3, 2016 By HKearl

After the District of Columbia (D.C.) city council hearing on street harassment in December, Councilmember Brianne Nadeau introduced legislation this week to form a D.C. Task Force on Street Harassment – and five council members have already signed on! This means D.C. is poised to be the first city in the USA to have such a taskforce.

Kudos to our partners Collective Action for Safe Spaces for working hard to make this possible. And we’re excited that when/if the taskforce is formed, Stop Street Harassment will be part of it!

Via Washington City Paper:

“The bill states the task force would be spearheaded by the D.C. Office on Human Rights and made up of representatives from several other city agencies as well as from community-based organizations. These members would prepare a report within a year on the possible collection of data on the prevalence of street harassment, strategies to address it in “high-risk areas,” bystander intervention training, and potential statutory changes. Still, Nadeau said the goal of the report is not to lock harassers up.“We need to create this change while being sensitive to the fact that young people, members of the LGBTQ community, people from communities of color, and people from low-income communities experience more frequent and severe harassment,” she said in a statement. “Any solution to the problem shouldn’t be an excuse to disproportionately target those same communities through criminalization.”