Texas § CR.5 - PROGRAMS

§ CR.5. PROGRAMS

PROGRAMS. (a) A program proposal must: (1) describe the counseling or treatment the program will offer; (2) include letters from a local law enforcement agency or agencies, courts, probation officers, and other community resources describing the community's commitment to improve the criminal justice system's response to victims and batterers and to cooperate with and interact in the programs' activities; (3) include a letter from the local shelter center describing the support services available to victims of family violence in the community and the shelter's commitment to cooperate and work with the program; and (4) describe the public education and local community outreach activities relating to family violence currently available in the community and a statement of commitment to participate on the local level in the public educational campaign described in Section 6 of this article. (b) A program must: (1) be situated in a county in which a shelter center is located; (2) offer counseling or treatment in which the primary approach is direct intervention with the batterer, on an individual or group basis, but that does not require the victim of the family violence to participate in the counseling or treatment; (3) offer training to law enforcement prosecutors, judges, probation officers, and others on the dynamics of family violence, treatment options, and program activities; and (4) have a system for receiving referrals from the courts and for reporting to the court regarding batterers' compliance with the treatment program. (c) This section does not preclude a program from serving a batterer other than one who was ordered by a court to participate in the program established under this subchapter.