FORT SILL, Oklahoma (April 4, 2022) — The Fort Sill community celebrated the grand- opening of its new Sexual Harassment / Assault Response Program Resource Center and Fusion Directorate — the first in TRADOC and one of only six in the Army.
The Fires Center of Excellence hosted an open house for the SHARP Resource Center and Fusion Directorate April 4. The event also marked the start of Sexual Assault Awareness and Prevention Month.
“The SHARP Resource Center and Fusion Directorate provides first-class care to those in need, and resources to those seeking information,” said Maj. Gen. Kenneth Kamper, commanding general, Fort Sill and Fires Center of Excellence. “That is what putting people first is all about.”
Fort Sill is one of six installations participating in the one-year trial of the Army pilot program — and the only Training and Doctrine Command installation — to redesign SHARP to be more victim-centered with the fusion directorate. The fusion directorate offers a synchronization of investigative, legal and advocacy services in a central location outside of a unit footprint, in an effort to provide privacy for the victims.
Speaking at the ribbon-cutting ceremony for the center, Command Sgt. Maj. Stephen Burnley, Fires Center of Excellence and Fort Sill command sergeant major. said the center is a “manifestation of putting people first, of taking care of those in our squad — America’s sons and daughters — who deserve first-class facilities, ease of access, and care, and taking care of folks by informing them of the many resources available to them.”
“Prevention starts with each of us, but I’ll add that so too does education and information,” said Burnley. “Aside from providing care, the resource center serves the larger community as a centralized capability, providing comprehensive training options, guidance, and resources in support of our conscious effort to understand, identify and reduce all risks that might lead to sexual assault and sexual harassment.”
The Fusion Directorate serves as a one-stop shop available to leaders and community members to provide information, guidance and resources. The fusion concept adjusts to comply with any future changes in federal law or Department of Defense policy.
The Army initiated the Sexual Assault Prevention and Response Program in 2004. The program began with three people — a sexual assault response coordinator, an advocate and a trainer. The program has evolved and grown into a comprehensive program with 17 full-time response coordinators and advocates who support commanders and collaborate with special victim counselors, prosecutors, special investigators, behavior health providers, forensic nurses and off-post organizations to support individuals requesting assistance.
“Sexual assault and harassment are crimes and behaviors that have no place in a professional military force. They undermine the values we defend and the cohesion our units demand. We must make a conscious effort to understand, identify and reduce all risks that might lead to sexual assault and sexual harassment. More importantly, we must intervene to protect those at risk,” said Leslie Watts, Fort Sill’s SHARP program manager and lead sexual assault response coordinator, to the dozens of people gathered for the ceremony.
“Sometimes people don’t report because they just don’t know where to turn so it’s important to let individuals know where they can go,” she said. “We want them to feel safe. In addition to our Soldiers, we also provide services to adult family members and Department of the Army civilians.”
Watts said the goals of the redesigned program are really to provide the best quality services to victims — the complainants of sexual harassment — to ensure that those services are quality services, and then to streamline their care.
“So we want to make sure that communication between command teams, advocates, and attorneys is streamline communication and it’s happening in an efficient and effective manner,” she said.
“We try to be very readily available to basic trainees that might need our assistance and family members that might need to come here. Having a one-stop shop where individuals can come outside of the unit footprint can be very beneficial for individuals who don’t want to report because they may not want their peers to know that they are exercising or utilizing SHARP services,” explained Watts. “If the offender is in the unit footprint, they may have concerns about that individual seeing them get assistance from the SHARP member in their organization.”
The resource center is now open at located at 2913 Custer Road.
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