May 15, 2023 • 26 mins
Kim Luckabaugh was named executive director of Reset180 in May of 2022. She is a passionate servant, seeking to work wherever God places her. He has given her a heart to care for those who are overlooked by our community and desperately need to know someone cares. God placed a tenderness in her heart for victims of trafficking at a women’s conference at her church, Reston Bible. Ever since she has been seeking ways to support these special women when God called her to this role of leading Reset180. Having experienced quite a number of challenging times in her life, she has deep compassion for those going through difficult journeys.
Kim was previously a senior program manager at Volunteer Fairfax and has held other professional and volunteer leadership positions. In September 2022, Governor Glenn Youngkin appointed her to serve on the Governor’s Advisory Board for Service and Volunteerism. She also serves in leadership roles on the Averett University Alumni Board and other local boards and community groups.
Kim is a lifelong Virginia and has lived in the City of Fairfax for 25 years with her husband. They have three adult children navigating college careers. She enjoys spending time with family and friends, reading historical fiction, visiting historical sites, and enjoying the beach at any time of the year.
Kim was previously a senior program manager at Volunteer Fairfax and has held other professional and volunteer leadership positions. In September 2022, Governor Glenn Youngkin appointed her to serve on the Governor’s Advisory Board for Service and Volunteerism. She also serves in leadership roles on the Averett University Alumni Board and other local boards and community groups.
Kim is a lifelong Virginia and has lived in the City of Fairfax for 25 years with her husband. They have three adult children navigating college careers. She enjoys spending time with family and friends, reading historical fiction, visiting historical sites, and enjoying the beach at any time of the year.
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Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
M and T Bank presents CEOs YouShould Know, powered by iHeart Asia in
celebration of women's history. Let's meetKim Luckaba. She is the executive director
for Resee at one eighty. Theyfocus on educating the community, specifically human
trafficking in Fairfax County. Before wetalk more about Kim's nonprofit, I first
asked her to talk a little bitabout herself, where she's from and her
(00:21):
origin story. Thank you. SoI am a Northern Virginia native. I
grew up in Ashbourn, Virginia whenit was dirt roads and cornfields. I
went to broad Run High School classof eighty seven, so definitely a local
yokel. My grandparents owned the landthat is now where Clyde's Willow Creek is.
That was land in our family fora couple of hundred years believed or
(00:43):
not. And that was just frommy mom's son. My dad's side is
from the Sterling area and there usedto be a small store there on Church
Road there at twenty eight prostance generalmerchandise, so my grandparents had to store
their back opened in nineteen forty sixuntil the early nineteen seven. So very
very rooted in our community and familymembers who are founding members of the Ashburn
(01:06):
Fire Department, and that's where Icut my teeth on service in the community.
So that's where my passion for helpingothers started. Well, thank you
for sharing all that. We arehere to talk about RESET one eighty and
there's so much to talk about,and you know, as I went on
your website over this past week preparingfor interview. First of all, it's
a great website. It's informative,educational, but also very sobering, and
(01:27):
we're going to talk about why thatis. But before we do any of
that, i'd like to ask you, as executive director. I saught by
your resume and you living here yourwhole life and being in Virginia. I
know why RESET one eighty was interestedin you, but why were you interested
in joining them? I have beenso passionate about making a difference where I
(01:49):
am and helping to restore the livesof those who have been impacted by some
kind of trauma that's happened in theirlife. Honestly, the desire to serve
others and to give back have beeninstilled to me from the very beginning of
my life. To be honest,with you through community service out in where
(02:09):
I grew up and in the church, and in the church has been such
an important part to remember to loveand care for others, and because that's
what Jesus has always modeled for usand that has been so foundational in my
life, that this was a greatplace for me to come and to help
restore the lives of those who havebeen hurt so badly. Okay, before
(02:31):
we talk about all the work andkind of get into the weeds of what
RESET one is, Kim, ifyou could first tell us what the mission
statement is. The mission statement ofRESET one eighty is to prevent human trafficking,
disrupt the related networks that feed it, and restore the lives of those
who have been impacted by human trafficking. Now, I know that there are
(02:53):
statistics, and you know we're goingto cover kind of your area of what
you do, and I guess wewant to give everybody a little bit of
context when it comes to that.But before we do that, I guess
I think we should be a littlebit educational here about human trafficking because everybody's
heard it. It's been in thenews for at least a decade now.
Pretty prevalent social media. You readit and you hear it on the news,
and it's an issue it seems likeeverywhere, not only in the United
(03:15):
States, but all around the world. And I'm glad you and your team
were tackling that. But exactly ifyou were to boil it down, what
is human trafficking so we can reallyunderstand it? Absolutely, that's a fantastic
foundational question. There is an actualdefinition to that, and the federal definition
is when a person is induced toprovide commercial sex or forced labor through force,
(03:37):
fraud, or coercion. But here'sthe other interesting point. If a
person is under eighteen and they areproviding sex or force labor, rather,
it is automatically defined as trafficking andthere is no such thing as a child
sex worker. They are an automaticvictim of trafficking. Okay, thank you
for sharing that. Now on yourwebsite, there's an easy nap We'll give
(04:00):
the website at the end of ourinterview and anything else that you need to
contact and donate, because that's reallya big part of recent one eighty is
they really rely on donations. Folks. I hope that you are enjoying this
and get educated, like I amtoday, But there's one little part on
the nab bar there that's our workand that looks to be a really important
one. And there are three differentcategories about prevent, disrupt, and restore.
(04:23):
Talk about all three of those,of you good boilers down each for
us, those are the foundational pillarsof our organization that we stand upon.
We work so hard to create awarenessabout what human trafficking is through community conversations
that we call our Human Trafficking oneoh one Presentation, and we take that
via our own Speakers Bureau, avolunteer team of people into the community to
(04:46):
educate the community on the four typesof trafficking, what the red flags are
for those forms of trafficking, andwho is vulnerable to those forms of trafficking,
and how to recognize all of thosepieces. So we do that through
that awareness piece that's prevention. Sothat's a real critical point, and we
are starting to develop even a youthversion of our one oh one that we
(05:10):
can use to help educate teams aboutwhat trafficking is and how to recognize if
they see it in any friends orpeers that they come in contact with.
So we want our youth to beeducated on this as well. Disruption is
where we want to disrupt the demandthat leads to human trafficking. We have
a couple of other volunteer teams.We are very volunteer heavy in our work,
(05:32):
many nonprofits are, and we areno exception to that rule. But
we actually go to the illicit massagebusinesses throughout the area and we have We're
very careful with this. We're notconfrontational or aggressive, but we actually have
trained volunteer teams that will go tothese businesses. And these are the businesses
that are trafficking women and holding themagainst their will to provide sexual services.
(05:57):
These are literally illicit massage businesses.And so we go and talk to the
men as they're approaching these businesses andtry to have very careful, grace filled
conversations with them. Do you understandwhat's happening here? Can you tell me
what you see in this business?Do they do this? Do they do
that? Have you ever experienced X, Y or z? And then educate
(06:17):
them as to what exactly is goingon in that business and hopefully, through
that conversation dissuade them from continuing toseek the services of the women in that
business. Trying to disrupt that demand. We also have a subscription to some
really terrific technology that will scrub websitesof phone numbers of people who are being
(06:41):
sold online for sexual purposes. Andthen we will actually reach out to those
individuals through a text texting app andwe will identify ourselves through an innocuous moniker.
Again, another team of volunteers,women that come to our office and
do this and will reach out andsay Hi, I'm Mercedes from Reset one
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eighty and we're trying to help peoplewho are being impacted by the commercial sex
industry. Can I talk to youmore about this and offer some resources to
you? And so we will starta conversation with this person via text message.
And yes, at times we arecussed out. Yes, at times
we are saying, hey, here'smy rates, come meet me at this
location. And other times we arereceiving messages back from people, I do
(07:25):
need help and I do want toget out of this line of work.
What can you do to help me? And then lastly, Restore is where
we are restoring the lives of thosewho have been impacted by human trafficking and
commercial sexual exploitation. Law enforcement willgive us some individuals. They say,
this person needs help, and sothey will connect people to us or other
(07:47):
social service organizations. This is avictim of trafficking and they need assistance.
We provide wrap around case management carefor those individuals. We don't have a
huge case load, it's actually somewhatsmall, but we have that starfish mentality.
We want to save and rescue andcare for that one life. That
one life is so critically important tous. And so we will take care
(08:11):
of two or three dozen women ayear in that capacity, and we will
help with financial stipends for food,for toiletries, for rent, for therapy,
for transportation, and to make surethat they are stabilized and whole.
And right now we're also working onexecuting developing a capital campaign to build a
(08:33):
shelter, the first shelter specifically forfemale victims of human trafficking in Northern Virginia.
Right now, there's no traff there'sno shelter specifically dedicated just for them
in Northern Virginia, and we wantto fill that void. Kim, thank
you for sharing all that you know. As you were talking about some of
those different pillars, I was justthinking of all the things I've read about
(08:54):
human trafficking specifically in our area.I know you have a few statistics that
you can share with us, butyou know, I always worry and wonder
about the cause and effect and howthese things happen, from somebody being sold
to another country to somebody bringing themover here with the promise of making money.
Before you know it, they're doingsomething that they don't want to do
(09:15):
and being held hostage against their will. Then you put the men in it
that are going for the services,and it goes on and on and on
with all these cause and effect thingsthat are happening. And I'm curious in
all of this, because you brieflymentioned them, what is your relationship with
law enforcement? And we don't needto get political, but how much are
they doing? What else can theydo to help? And where are they
(09:37):
in this whole story Because we alwayssee in the news about the arrest and
taking over, the solicitation, soforth and so on. But what's the
relationship with police specifically in the areathat you work with and where is that
right now? We have a reallygood relationship with law enforcement, and we
work with local and federal and weare developing relationships in with state law enforcement
(10:00):
too. It's so all encompassing,and we are sought out partner with them.
Virginia State Police contacted us back inthe latter part of the summer asking
us for help with some victims thatthey recovered in a drug bus who are
actual victims of human trafficking. Well, and so they asked us for assistance
with some of the resource needs thatthey had. We receive other calls from
(10:24):
detectives in Fairfax County or Allowed Inor wherever. And there are other times
that we have information that we needto get to law enforcement. So we
have a really good back and forthrelationship with them when we work with the
FBI and different other entities, andso we have a really good back and
forth. All right, I don'twant to make the assumption it's all men,
but I think I'm just going tosay, for the lack of a
(10:46):
purpose of my question, when somebodyfrom your team presents themselves to a guy
who might be walking up to oneof these places, and if you do
get to the opportunity to talk tothem, what do they say to you
about all of this? And Ihave a feeling that they're not educated,
like getting educated right now with ourlisteners about exactly what's going on and what
they're walking into. We get ahost of responses. We get the oh,
(11:09):
this is my first time, I'venever been here before, or I
had no idea, I didn't knowthat was happening, or then we get
the person who just tries to runaway from us. They do not want
to have any conversation, right,But if we can start off with getting
their attention and getting them just tostop for a few minutes with us and
engage with us for a couple ofquestions, we can maintain a conversation with
(11:30):
them for thirty minutes forty five minutes, and we go through what is really
going on, How those women gotto be there. No, they're not
enjoying it, they're faking it.So they are wonderful actresses, but because
they have a bounty over their headand they have to be right. And
so when we are able to enlightenthem to that happening for many of them
(11:52):
that I had no idea. Butthere are others that's what they do every
week, and they're the one tryingto skirt us, and they're gonna sit
there and say, basically, thisis just what I do right, Well,
educating one at a time is alsoa good way to go. I
didn't mention briefly some statistics and maybeyou can share some of our audience about
(12:13):
what you're looking at, and wedon't have to go into the weeds of
this, but what can you sharewith us that would enlighten us and educate
us a little bit on statistics thatmaybe you've seen, whether it's an annual
thing or something that would just getus to the next point of where we're
talking about here. Absolutely. Well, first, let me go back a
little bit on some of the formsof trafficking too, because the elicit massage
business one is one that is veryidentifiable. But there are four types of
(12:37):
trafficking president Northern Virginia. We seefamilial trafficking where parents literally traffic out their
children pay their rent or something likethat, or for drug money. Even
we see gang control trafficking, whichis pretty self explanatory initiation or to pay
your way into the gang. Wesee the imb trafficking, So we see
(13:01):
we just see all kinds of thingshere, but we see the yeah,
the familial gangs, pimp controlled.The pimp controlled is another piece of it.
And the illicit massage businesses. Sothere are several kinds of forms of
trafficking present right here, and it'simpacting all ages, all genders, all
(13:22):
nationalities. Is not anyone in focusthing. However, some statistics I think
that your audience would be particularly interestedin. So the technology form that I
told you that we subscribe to providedus with some specific data points over the
past few years, and so wewere showing that in January twenty twenty one,
(13:43):
six hundred and fifty people were beingsold online for sexual services within a
fifty mile radius of our office andresting. In October twenty twenty one,
it grew to three thousand, sixninety four, in March twenty twenty two
eight thousand, one hundred fifty two, and then in October of twenty twenty
(14:05):
two it was fifteen thousand, sixhundred sixty people being sold online. And
those are specific dates in time datapoints. Quarters. Now let me take
that out a little bit further foryou. What we've also learned is that
in twenty nineteen there were nineteen thousand, eight hundred seventy three individuals listed online
(14:28):
for sexual services. This is theentire year, and that's within that fifty
mile radius of our office. Intwenty twenty, that number rose to ninety
two thousand, eight hundred eighty threein twenty twenty one one hundred twenty one
thousand, seven hundred eighty three onlinelistings, and then in twenty twenty two
(14:50):
it was one hundred forty eight thousand, two hundred and six listings online for
sexual services. So that is justthat one piece of it. Also identified
in Fairfax County alone, there areover one hundred and twenty three illicit massage
businesses. When we were able todissect that a bit more, we were
(15:11):
understanding that there were looking for mynumbers here, that these places are locations
where the women cannot leave, andthat there are according to what we have
a imb and illicit massage business study, so we can estimate that there are
for each victim worker that they willhave approximately twelve hundred customer visits each year.
(15:35):
There are conservatively two hundred and fortywomen exploited in the over one hundred
and twenty illicit massage businesses in FairfaxCounty. So when you take two hundred
and forty women, multiply that bythe twelve hundred customer visits per year,
that that comes out to two hundredand eighty eight thousand occurrences of exploitation every
(15:56):
year in Fairfax County. Essentially twohundred eight thousand episodes of right every year
in Fairfax County. Well, andfolks, when you're listening to those numbers,
that's just in Fairfax County, sojust imagine and the other counties of
what's going on too, And thosenumbers are extraordinary and mind boggling. Kim,
(16:17):
I'm just blown away by that.It's it's you've just ketch your handsful
with everything, and so does lawenforcement. And as you're doing all this
good work. It's even like thenumbers keep on doubling up annually too,
which is frustrating, which leads meto my Yeah, I want to it's
a twenty four million dollar industry Fairfax. That's unbelievable. I did want to
ask you a few more things whenit comes to challenges, and I want
(16:40):
to ask about a success story,because I bet you have a good one.
But I think it's obvious about thechallenges we mentioned a couple of.
But you know, as we talktoday right now, what's one of your
biggest challenges as you do this jobevery day? So well with your team,
what's standing in your way right nowto make it just a little bit
more difficult each each and every day, I think the Okay, So the
(17:04):
basic answer is funding. That's alwaysour nonprofit. That's always going to be
that's always a piece that's going tohinder us from being as fully capable of
the work that we are called todo as possible. But outside of that,
we look at just some of theresource needs to care for the women,
(17:25):
access to trauma, inform care forthe women that we serve and care
for. We look at just someof the other necessities that we need to
provide for them right now. Comingup with the plans of building our house,
we are being very diligent in thework that we are doing, working
with some industry experts on in theshelter industry to make sure we have the
(17:48):
best possible design of the house thatwe're going to build. So having some
of the access to those plans andis very important to us. Regulations,
the ordinances are relations in our localjurisdictions as it applies to the elisit massage
businesses. Making sure that our localleaders can grasp the severity this issue and
(18:11):
craft ordinances that will shut these placesdown, make Fairfax and other jurisdictions inhospitable
places for these places to work,and then being able to provide workforce development
opportunities for these women that are rescuedfrom those places. Many of them do
not speak English, and I promisethis is nothing, This is not a
(18:32):
racist common at all. But oneof the women that are trafficked in those
businesses are Asian and it's heartbreaking.And Fairfax County is predominantly Korean. There
are many who are Chinese, butthose are the nationalities and the women that
are being brought here and they're they'retrapped in these businesses. They don't speak
(18:52):
English, they don't have skill sets, and they need to develop those workforce
skills to translate to another another jobopportunity if we're able to get them out
of those places. But being ableto provide a trauma informed work environment for
victims of trafficking is really important,and I would encourage all the businesses out
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there to learn more about what beinga trauma informed business means and how you
can provide that as a resource toemployment for these survivors of trafficking. They
can be easily triggered in many differentways and things that we think is just
a non issue. Just the waythat you look or talk to them,
it may trigger something. It couldbe a smell, it could be the
(19:38):
manner that you walk. It's nothingthat you really are you're trying to do
to harm someone. We're not doingany of this intentional, but we don't
know the triggers that they have,and when the trigger is pulled, then
that's going to negatively impact them.And so having an understanding of what a
trauma informed workplace this and how toprovide that that really helps these women survive
(20:03):
and grow and it's so important.All right, Kim, thank you for
sharing all that, and I promisewe're going to give the website address the
RL at the end of our interview, and you already hadn't googled it.
Donations are a really big deal.So if you took anything away from what
Kim was talking about, donations area very big deal to reset one eighty
everybody, So please keep that inmind as we finish up our conversation here.
All right, how about a successstory, because there's got to be
(20:26):
one that sticks with you that yousaid, you know what, we knocked
that one out of the park.That was one life that we saved.
We made a difference and just somethingspecial that you went to sleep that night
and said, you know what,I'm doing the right thing. I made
a difference here. Well to sharea story with us, Kim. While
there are few, I can thinkof one with our phone texting outreach,
(20:48):
This was a really sweet story.I love this one. I was one
of the nights I was actually workingwith our phone text team and we received
a text message from It was along time interaction with this volatier and this
was woman and she had been havinga back and forth over a period of
time with her and she reached outand said, I don't know how to
(21:11):
leave this. I don't I needsomething else to go to. I can't
do this anymore. We asked herto dream with us, and this is
all through text messaging. If youwere to leave this work, what would
you like to do? And wehelped her dream and what kind of things
do you enjoy? Well, Ienjoy going to the gym, and well
maybe you could work at a frontdesk for a gym, or hey,
(21:34):
what about a rec center? Andso we started helping her envision herself outside
of the work she was in andgave her some points on how she could
look for other work to get herout of this. And so a couple
of weeks later, we received atext message from her totally unsolicited, and
she was so excited and she foundanother job and she was sharing with us
(21:57):
that she applied for a she gotit. She was doing terrific. And
then another couple of weeks went byand she texted us again again unsolicited,
and she said, I got rankednumber three in the work that I'm doing.
Wow. And she was so proudof herself for her accomplishments, and
we were rejoicing with her because allwe did was encourage her. She did
(22:22):
the rest. She just needed someoneto get behind her and empower her,
to help her to dream and seeanother life. And she realized that she
wasn't trapped. She just needed someoneto help her think big, think something
different, to envision a life outsideof the work she was doing, and
so she was able to get outof well. You know, Kim,
(22:44):
I also might takeaway from that storyand it's a lovely story, is also
that you were just listening. Somepeople just want to be acknowledged and heard
when they're in a tough spot.And while you might empowered her, I
think just the listening part at thebeginning with texting is an extraordinary It's a
simple story a while a powerful story. Thank you for sharing that. Well,
listen as we wrap up our conversation, there's still so much that we
(23:07):
could talk about it and I wantto revisit with you something downline. I
hope we get a chance to talkagain, because the subject is not worthy
of a twenty five minute conversation.As you know, there's so much more
that we can talk about. Butif you were to have our listener with
maybe one big takeaway when it comesto reset one eight and what you do
and what you are doing, whatwould it be? I would say that
(23:32):
I want them to understand. Pleaselisteners, understand that this is a local
issue. This is something in yourbackyard. This is happening in the office
park where your dentist is. It'shappening in your child school. Potentially it
is happening maybe even in your church, and so be aware, look for
(23:56):
and understand what the red flags aren'tyou need help with that, contact us.
We will do a one oh onepresentation with a group that you choose
us to come speak with. We'rehappy to do that, and then also
partner with us. While we area faith based organization, we don't have
that requirement of anyone we serve andwe want to be the hands and fee
(24:18):
to Jesus serving others. But youcan come alongside us and help make a
difference, because we like to saythat there is hope change can happen,
and you are a key to someoneelse's freedom. You possess that power in
your hands just by generating awareness amongyour community members. Maybe you would want
to volunteer with us. Maybe thisis something that has really reached out to
(24:41):
you and you want to serve withus. We welcome that. There as
a tab on our website the bottomvolunteer and then give. I don't want
to underestimate that importance are overestimated,but giving is so important and if you
are a person of faith, pleasepray that is foundational to the work where
you're doing. So those are fourways that people can come alongside us and
(25:03):
support us very good in that Give. Now it's a big fat kind of
green button on the right end sidetop of the page. Cambets is on
every page, so we would likeyou to donate if you feel like that's
something you would like to do,especially for the Fairfax County community that we're
specifically talking about. Kim, let'sgive that website address so people can find
all the information. Absolutely, weare located at www dot reset one eighty
(25:26):
dot com. Yes, I understandthat's a dot com. We are a
nonprofit five O one C three,but www Reset one eight dot com.
Kim, I can't tell you howmuch I appreciate your time and all that
you're doing with you and your teamthere continue success because there are some nice
success stories. I know. It'sa lot of hard work, and as
I talked about off the top ofour interview, it's sobering for a lot
(25:48):
of people like myself that are nowmore educated after listening to you talk about
this. But what's going on thereis the numbers rise. I'm glad there
are people like you and your teamout there and the people that are donating
trying to help to release serious issuewith human trafficking in the Fairfax County area.
Thank you so much for joining uson CEOs. You should know we
really appreciate it. Thank you somuch. My team and I really appreciate
(26:10):
this opportunity. Our community partner,M and T Bank supports CEOs, you
should know as part of their ongoingcommitment to building strong communities, and that
starts by backing the businesses within them. As a bank for communities, M
and T believes in dedicating time,talent, and resources to help local businesses
thrive because when businesses succeed, ourcommunities succeed.
M and T Bank presents CEOs YouShould Know, powered by iHeart Asia in
celebration of women's history. Let's meetKim Luckaba. She is the executive director
for Resee at one eighty. Theyfocus on educating the community, specifically human
trafficking in Fairfax County. Before wetalk more about Kim's nonprofit, I first
asked her to talk a little bitabout herself, where she's from and her
(00:21):
origin story. Thank you. SoI am a Northern Virginia native. I
grew up in Ashbourn, Virginia whenit was dirt roads and cornfields. I
went to broad Run High School classof eighty seven, so definitely a local
yokel. My grandparents owned the landthat is now where Clyde's Willow Creek is.
That was land in our family fora couple of hundred years believed or
(00:43):
not. And that was just frommy mom's son. My dad's side is
from the Sterling area and there usedto be a small store there on Church
Road there at twenty eight prostance generalmerchandise, so my grandparents had to store
their back opened in nineteen forty sixuntil the early nineteen seven. So very
very rooted in our community and familymembers who are founding members of the Ashburn
(01:06):
Fire Department, and that's where Icut my teeth on service in the community.
So that's where my passion for helpingothers started. Well, thank you
for sharing all that. We arehere to talk about RESET one eighty and
there's so much to talk about,and you know, as I went on
your website over this past week preparingfor interview. First of all, it's
a great website. It's informative,educational, but also very sobering, and
(01:27):
we're going to talk about why thatis. But before we do any of
that, i'd like to ask you, as executive director. I saught by
your resume and you living here yourwhole life and being in Virginia. I
know why RESET one eighty was interestedin you, but why were you interested
in joining them? I have beenso passionate about making a difference where I
(01:49):
am and helping to restore the livesof those who have been impacted by some
kind of trauma that's happened in theirlife. Honestly, the desire to serve
others and to give back have beeninstilled to me from the very beginning of
my life. To be honest,with you through community service out in where
(02:09):
I grew up and in the church, and in the church has been such
an important part to remember to loveand care for others, and because that's
what Jesus has always modeled for usand that has been so foundational in my
life, that this was a greatplace for me to come and to help
restore the lives of those who havebeen hurt so badly. Okay, before
(02:31):
we talk about all the work andkind of get into the weeds of what
RESET one is, Kim, ifyou could first tell us what the mission
statement is. The mission statement ofRESET one eighty is to prevent human trafficking,
disrupt the related networks that feed it, and restore the lives of those
who have been impacted by human trafficking. Now, I know that there are
(02:53):
statistics, and you know we're goingto cover kind of your area of what
you do, and I guess wewant to give everybody a little bit of
context when it comes to that.But before we do that, I guess
I think we should be a littlebit educational here about human trafficking because everybody's
heard it. It's been in thenews for at least a decade now.
Pretty prevalent social media. You readit and you hear it on the news,
and it's an issue it seems likeeverywhere, not only in the United
(03:15):
States, but all around the world. And I'm glad you and your team
were tackling that. But exactly ifyou were to boil it down, what
is human trafficking so we can reallyunderstand it? Absolutely, that's a fantastic
foundational question. There is an actualdefinition to that, and the federal definition
is when a person is induced toprovide commercial sex or forced labor through force,
(03:37):
fraud, or coercion. But here'sthe other interesting point. If a
person is under eighteen and they areproviding sex or force labor, rather,
it is automatically defined as trafficking andthere is no such thing as a child
sex worker. They are an automaticvictim of trafficking. Okay, thank you
for sharing that. Now on yourwebsite, there's an easy nap We'll give
(04:00):
the website at the end of ourinterview and anything else that you need to
contact and donate, because that's reallya big part of recent one eighty is
they really rely on donations. Folks. I hope that you are enjoying this
and get educated, like I amtoday, But there's one little part on
the nab bar there that's our workand that looks to be a really important
one. And there are three differentcategories about prevent, disrupt, and restore.
(04:23):
Talk about all three of those,of you good boilers down each for
us, those are the foundational pillarsof our organization that we stand upon.
We work so hard to create awarenessabout what human trafficking is through community conversations
that we call our Human Trafficking oneoh one Presentation, and we take that
via our own Speakers Bureau, avolunteer team of people into the community to
(04:46):
educate the community on the four typesof trafficking, what the red flags are
for those forms of trafficking, andwho is vulnerable to those forms of trafficking,
and how to recognize all of thosepieces. So we do that through
that awareness piece that's prevention. Sothat's a real critical point, and we
are starting to develop even a youthversion of our one oh one that we
(05:10):
can use to help educate teams aboutwhat trafficking is and how to recognize if
they see it in any friends orpeers that they come in contact with.
So we want our youth to beeducated on this as well. Disruption is
where we want to disrupt the demandthat leads to human trafficking. We have
a couple of other volunteer teams.We are very volunteer heavy in our work,
(05:32):
many nonprofits are, and we areno exception to that rule. But
we actually go to the illicit massagebusinesses throughout the area and we have We're
very careful with this. We're notconfrontational or aggressive, but we actually have
trained volunteer teams that will go tothese businesses. And these are the businesses
that are trafficking women and holding themagainst their will to provide sexual services.
(05:57):
These are literally illicit massage businesses.And so we go and talk to the
men as they're approaching these businesses andtry to have very careful, grace filled
conversations with them. Do you understandwhat's happening here? Can you tell me
what you see in this business?Do they do this? Do they do
that? Have you ever experienced X, Y or z? And then educate
(06:17):
them as to what exactly is goingon in that business and hopefully, through
that conversation dissuade them from continuing toseek the services of the women in that
business. Trying to disrupt that demand. We also have a subscription to some
really terrific technology that will scrub websitesof phone numbers of people who are being
(06:41):
sold online for sexual purposes. Andthen we will actually reach out to those
individuals through a text texting app andwe will identify ourselves through an innocuous moniker.
Again, another team of volunteers,women that come to our office and
do this and will reach out andsay Hi, I'm Mercedes from Reset one
(07:01):
eighty and we're trying to help peoplewho are being impacted by the commercial sex
industry. Can I talk to youmore about this and offer some resources to
you? And so we will starta conversation with this person via text message.
And yes, at times we arecussed out. Yes, at times
we are saying, hey, here'smy rates, come meet me at this
location. And other times we arereceiving messages back from people, I do
(07:25):
need help and I do want toget out of this line of work.
What can you do to help me? And then lastly, Restore is where
we are restoring the lives of thosewho have been impacted by human trafficking and
commercial sexual exploitation. Law enforcement willgive us some individuals. They say,
this person needs help, and sothey will connect people to us or other
(07:47):
social service organizations. This is avictim of trafficking and they need assistance.
We provide wrap around case management carefor those individuals. We don't have a
huge case load, it's actually somewhatsmall, but we have that starfish mentality.
We want to save and rescue andcare for that one life. That
one life is so critically important tous. And so we will take care
(08:11):
of two or three dozen women ayear in that capacity, and we will
help with financial stipends for food,for toiletries, for rent, for therapy,
for transportation, and to make surethat they are stabilized and whole.
And right now we're also working onexecuting developing a capital campaign to build a
(08:33):
shelter, the first shelter specifically forfemale victims of human trafficking in Northern Virginia.
Right now, there's no traff there'sno shelter specifically dedicated just for them
in Northern Virginia, and we wantto fill that void. Kim, thank
you for sharing all that you know. As you were talking about some of
those different pillars, I was justthinking of all the things I've read about
(08:54):
human trafficking specifically in our area.I know you have a few statistics that
you can share with us, butyou know, I always worry and wonder
about the cause and effect and howthese things happen, from somebody being sold
to another country to somebody bringing themover here with the promise of making money.
Before you know it, they're doingsomething that they don't want to do
(09:15):
and being held hostage against their will. Then you put the men in it
that are going for the services,and it goes on and on and on
with all these cause and effect thingsthat are happening. And I'm curious in
all of this, because you brieflymentioned them, what is your relationship with
law enforcement? And we don't needto get political, but how much are
they doing? What else can theydo to help? And where are they
(09:37):
in this whole story Because we alwayssee in the news about the arrest and
taking over, the solicitation, soforth and so on. But what's the
relationship with police specifically in the areathat you work with and where is that
right now? We have a reallygood relationship with law enforcement, and we
work with local and federal and weare developing relationships in with state law enforcement
(10:00):
too. It's so all encompassing,and we are sought out partner with them.
Virginia State Police contacted us back inthe latter part of the summer asking
us for help with some victims thatthey recovered in a drug bus who are
actual victims of human trafficking. Well, and so they asked us for assistance
with some of the resource needs thatthey had. We receive other calls from
(10:24):
detectives in Fairfax County or Allowed Inor wherever. And there are other times
that we have information that we needto get to law enforcement. So we
have a really good back and forthrelationship with them when we work with the
FBI and different other entities, andso we have a really good back and
forth. All right, I don'twant to make the assumption it's all men,
but I think I'm just going tosay, for the lack of a
(10:46):
purpose of my question, when somebodyfrom your team presents themselves to a guy
who might be walking up to oneof these places, and if you do
get to the opportunity to talk tothem, what do they say to you
about all of this? And Ihave a feeling that they're not educated,
like getting educated right now with ourlisteners about exactly what's going on and what
they're walking into. We get ahost of responses. We get the oh,
(11:09):
this is my first time, I'venever been here before, or I
had no idea, I didn't knowthat was happening, or then we get
the person who just tries to runaway from us. They do not want
to have any conversation, right,But if we can start off with getting
their attention and getting them just tostop for a few minutes with us and
engage with us for a couple ofquestions, we can maintain a conversation with
(11:30):
them for thirty minutes forty five minutes, and we go through what is really
going on, How those women gotto be there. No, they're not
enjoying it, they're faking it.So they are wonderful actresses, but because
they have a bounty over their headand they have to be right. And
so when we are able to enlightenthem to that happening for many of them
(11:52):
that I had no idea. Butthere are others that's what they do every
week, and they're the one tryingto skirt us, and they're gonna sit
there and say, basically, thisis just what I do right, Well,
educating one at a time is alsoa good way to go. I
didn't mention briefly some statistics and maybeyou can share some of our audience about
(12:13):
what you're looking at, and wedon't have to go into the weeds of
this, but what can you sharewith us that would enlighten us and educate
us a little bit on statistics thatmaybe you've seen, whether it's an annual
thing or something that would just getus to the next point of where we're
talking about here. Absolutely. Well, first, let me go back a
little bit on some of the formsof trafficking too, because the elicit massage
business one is one that is veryidentifiable. But there are four types of
(12:37):
trafficking president Northern Virginia. We seefamilial trafficking where parents literally traffic out their
children pay their rent or something likethat, or for drug money. Even
we see gang control trafficking, whichis pretty self explanatory initiation or to pay
your way into the gang. Wesee the imb trafficking, So we see
(13:01):
we just see all kinds of thingshere, but we see the yeah,
the familial gangs, pimp controlled.The pimp controlled is another piece of it.
And the illicit massage businesses. Sothere are several kinds of forms of
trafficking present right here, and it'simpacting all ages, all genders, all
(13:22):
nationalities. Is not anyone in focusthing. However, some statistics I think
that your audience would be particularly interestedin. So the technology form that I
told you that we subscribe to providedus with some specific data points over the
past few years, and so wewere showing that in January twenty twenty one,
(13:43):
six hundred and fifty people were beingsold online for sexual services within a
fifty mile radius of our office andresting. In October twenty twenty one,
it grew to three thousand, sixninety four, in March twenty twenty two
eight thousand, one hundred fifty two, and then in October of twenty twenty
(14:05):
two it was fifteen thousand, sixhundred sixty people being sold online. And
those are specific dates in time datapoints. Quarters. Now let me take
that out a little bit further foryou. What we've also learned is that
in twenty nineteen there were nineteen thousand, eight hundred seventy three individuals listed online
(14:28):
for sexual services. This is theentire year, and that's within that fifty
mile radius of our office. Intwenty twenty, that number rose to ninety
two thousand, eight hundred eighty threein twenty twenty one one hundred twenty one
thousand, seven hundred eighty three onlinelistings, and then in twenty twenty two
(14:50):
it was one hundred forty eight thousand, two hundred and six listings online for
sexual services. So that is justthat one piece of it. Also identified
in Fairfax County alone, there areover one hundred and twenty three illicit massage
businesses. When we were able todissect that a bit more, we were
(15:11):
understanding that there were looking for mynumbers here, that these places are locations
where the women cannot leave, andthat there are according to what we have
a imb and illicit massage business study, so we can estimate that there are
for each victim worker that they willhave approximately twelve hundred customer visits each year.
(15:35):
There are conservatively two hundred and fortywomen exploited in the over one hundred
and twenty illicit massage businesses in FairfaxCounty. So when you take two hundred
and forty women, multiply that bythe twelve hundred customer visits per year,
that that comes out to two hundredand eighty eight thousand occurrences of exploitation every
(15:56):
year in Fairfax County. Essentially twohundred eight thousand episodes of right every year
in Fairfax County. Well, andfolks, when you're listening to those numbers,
that's just in Fairfax County, sojust imagine and the other counties of
what's going on too, And thosenumbers are extraordinary and mind boggling. Kim,
(16:17):
I'm just blown away by that.It's it's you've just ketch your handsful
with everything, and so does lawenforcement. And as you're doing all this
good work. It's even like thenumbers keep on doubling up annually too,
which is frustrating, which leads meto my Yeah, I want to it's
a twenty four million dollar industry Fairfax. That's unbelievable. I did want to
ask you a few more things whenit comes to challenges, and I want
(16:40):
to ask about a success story,because I bet you have a good one.
But I think it's obvious about thechallenges we mentioned a couple of.
But you know, as we talktoday right now, what's one of your
biggest challenges as you do this jobevery day? So well with your team,
what's standing in your way right nowto make it just a little bit
more difficult each each and every day, I think the Okay, So the
(17:04):
basic answer is funding. That's alwaysour nonprofit. That's always going to be
that's always a piece that's going tohinder us from being as fully capable of
the work that we are called todo as possible. But outside of that,
we look at just some of theresource needs to care for the women,
(17:25):
access to trauma, inform care forthe women that we serve and care
for. We look at just someof the other necessities that we need to
provide for them right now. Comingup with the plans of building our house,
we are being very diligent in thework that we are doing, working
with some industry experts on in theshelter industry to make sure we have the
(17:48):
best possible design of the house thatwe're going to build. So having some
of the access to those plans andis very important to us. Regulations,
the ordinances are relations in our localjurisdictions as it applies to the elisit massage
businesses. Making sure that our localleaders can grasp the severity this issue and
(18:11):
craft ordinances that will shut these placesdown, make Fairfax and other jurisdictions inhospitable
places for these places to work,and then being able to provide workforce development
opportunities for these women that are rescuedfrom those places. Many of them do
not speak English, and I promisethis is nothing, This is not a
(18:32):
racist common at all. But oneof the women that are trafficked in those
businesses are Asian and it's heartbreaking.And Fairfax County is predominantly Korean. There
are many who are Chinese, butthose are the nationalities and the women that
are being brought here and they're they'retrapped in these businesses. They don't speak
(18:52):
English, they don't have skill sets, and they need to develop those workforce
skills to translate to another another jobopportunity if we're able to get them out
of those places. But being ableto provide a trauma informed work environment for
victims of trafficking is really important,and I would encourage all the businesses out
(19:15):
there to learn more about what beinga trauma informed business means and how you
can provide that as a resource toemployment for these survivors of trafficking. They
can be easily triggered in many differentways and things that we think is just
a non issue. Just the waythat you look or talk to them,
it may trigger something. It couldbe a smell, it could be the
(19:38):
manner that you walk. It's nothingthat you really are you're trying to do
to harm someone. We're not doingany of this intentional, but we don't
know the triggers that they have,and when the trigger is pulled, then
that's going to negatively impact them.And so having an understanding of what a
trauma informed workplace this and how toprovide that that really helps these women survive
(20:03):
and grow and it's so important.All right, Kim, thank you for
sharing all that, and I promisewe're going to give the website address the
RL at the end of our interview, and you already hadn't googled it.
Donations are a really big deal.So if you took anything away from what
Kim was talking about, donations area very big deal to reset one eighty
everybody, So please keep that inmind as we finish up our conversation here.
All right, how about a successstory, because there's got to be
(20:26):
one that sticks with you that yousaid, you know what, we knocked
that one out of the park.That was one life that we saved.
We made a difference and just somethingspecial that you went to sleep that night
and said, you know what,I'm doing the right thing. I made
a difference here. Well to sharea story with us, Kim. While
there are few, I can thinkof one with our phone texting outreach,
(20:48):
This was a really sweet story.I love this one. I was one
of the nights I was actually workingwith our phone text team and we received
a text message from It was along time interaction with this volatier and this
was woman and she had been havinga back and forth over a period of
time with her and she reached outand said, I don't know how to
(21:11):
leave this. I don't I needsomething else to go to. I can't
do this anymore. We asked herto dream with us, and this is
all through text messaging. If youwere to leave this work, what would
you like to do? And wehelped her dream and what kind of things
do you enjoy? Well, Ienjoy going to the gym, and well
maybe you could work at a frontdesk for a gym, or hey,
(21:34):
what about a rec center? Andso we started helping her envision herself outside
of the work she was in andgave her some points on how she could
look for other work to get herout of this. And so a couple
of weeks later, we received atext message from her totally unsolicited, and
she was so excited and she foundanother job and she was sharing with us
(21:57):
that she applied for a she gotit. She was doing terrific. And
then another couple of weeks went byand she texted us again again unsolicited,
and she said, I got rankednumber three in the work that I'm doing.
Wow. And she was so proudof herself for her accomplishments, and
we were rejoicing with her because allwe did was encourage her. She did
(22:22):
the rest. She just needed someoneto get behind her and empower her,
to help her to dream and seeanother life. And she realized that she
wasn't trapped. She just needed someoneto help her think big, think something
different, to envision a life outsideof the work she was doing, and
so she was able to get outof well. You know, Kim,
(22:44):
I also might takeaway from that storyand it's a lovely story, is also
that you were just listening. Somepeople just want to be acknowledged and heard
when they're in a tough spot.And while you might empowered her, I
think just the listening part at thebeginning with texting is an extraordinary It's a
simple story a while a powerful story. Thank you for sharing that. Well,
listen as we wrap up our conversation, there's still so much that we
(23:07):
could talk about it and I wantto revisit with you something downline. I
hope we get a chance to talkagain, because the subject is not worthy
of a twenty five minute conversation.As you know, there's so much more
that we can talk about. Butif you were to have our listener with
maybe one big takeaway when it comesto reset one eight and what you do
and what you are doing, whatwould it be? I would say that
(23:32):
I want them to understand. Pleaselisteners, understand that this is a local
issue. This is something in yourbackyard. This is happening in the office
park where your dentist is. It'shappening in your child school. Potentially it
is happening maybe even in your church, and so be aware, look for
(23:56):
and understand what the red flags aren'tyou need help with that, contact us.
We will do a one oh onepresentation with a group that you choose
us to come speak with. We'rehappy to do that, and then also
partner with us. While we area faith based organization, we don't have
that requirement of anyone we serve andwe want to be the hands and fee
(24:18):
to Jesus serving others. But youcan come alongside us and help make a
difference, because we like to saythat there is hope change can happen,
and you are a key to someoneelse's freedom. You possess that power in
your hands just by generating awareness amongyour community members. Maybe you would want
to volunteer with us. Maybe thisis something that has really reached out to
(24:41):
you and you want to serve withus. We welcome that. There as
a tab on our website the bottomvolunteer and then give. I don't want
to underestimate that importance are overestimated,but giving is so important and if you
are a person of faith, pleasepray that is foundational to the work where
you're doing. So those are fourways that people can come alongside us and
(25:03):
support us very good in that Give. Now it's a big fat kind of
green button on the right end sidetop of the page. Cambets is on
every page, so we would likeyou to donate if you feel like that's
something you would like to do,especially for the Fairfax County community that we're
specifically talking about. Kim, let'sgive that website address so people can find
all the information. Absolutely, weare located at www dot reset one eighty
(25:26):
dot com. Yes, I understandthat's a dot com. We are a
nonprofit five O one C three,but www Reset one eight dot com.
Kim, I can't tell you howmuch I appreciate your time and all that
you're doing with you and your teamthere continue success because there are some nice
success stories. I know. It'sa lot of hard work, and as
I talked about off the top ofour interview, it's sobering for a lot
(25:48):
of people like myself that are nowmore educated after listening to you talk about
this. But what's going on thereis the numbers rise. I'm glad there
are people like you and your teamout there and the people that are donating
trying to help to release serious issuewith human trafficking in the Fairfax County area.
Thank you so much for joining uson CEOs. You should know we
really appreciate it. Thank you somuch. My team and I really appreciate
(26:10):
this opportunity. Our community partner,M and T Bank supports CEOs, you
should know as part of their ongoingcommitment to building strong communities, and that
starts by backing the businesses within them. As a bank for communities, M
and T believes in dedicating time,talent, and resources to help local businesses
thrive because when businesses succeed, ourcommunities succeed.
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