DES MOINES, Iowa — After roughly a year of studying the Court Avenue Historic District, Responsible Hospitality Institute says preventing sexual violence and harassment should be on the city's to-do list moving forward.
"Any community with a vibrant social economy needs to have a focus on women's safety both for employees and for patrons," said RHI Vice President Alicia Scholer during a city council work session Monday morning.
Joe Reilly is the nighttime mayor in Iowa City, a position RHI recommends Des Moines adopt to improve safety. Reilly says he's the liaison to bring community partners and venues together.
For example, he's worked with the rape victim advocacy program at the University of Iowa to put on bystander intervention training for bar and restaurant staff.
"It really helps them think about one getting comfortable with the uncomfortableness of the subject," Reilly said. "But also taking action on other people's behalf, but also doing it at your own comfort level. This training that RVAP puts on, Raise the Bar, walks them through a couple different scenarios that they might see in person, but also gives them tactics to defuse or disarm a situation."
Reilly says since the yearly training has been in place, the confidence in staffers to be an advocate for their community has only grown.
"We'll still have people who, they've been through several trainings, but they are so adamant about it, and they want to bring their other staff members and co-workers to it," he added. "I think people feel more confident about having a community like that when they know that it's not just one organization's job to look out for this aspect, when you're sharing that knowledge, you're powering people, and then your community strengthens through that."
The next steps of the RHI study were discussed during a work session Monday morning, including working to bring partners like business owners, up to speed on the report.