“Our phone still rings every day,” said Brenda McBride, director of D/SAOC. “We’re looking forward to trying to do the work we do without the obstacle of the virus.”

D/SAOC’s annual cake fundraiser, which previously averaged $60,000 for the organization each year, was canceled in April 2020 due to COVID-19. With its usual venue at Iowa Central Community College’s East Campus slated to distribute vaccinations and testing this year, McBride said the organization will likely not have the fundraiser in 2021, either.

“We are going to explore some other opportunities,” she said. “It might be a mailing or some type of online or virtual event. But we know that it won’t be the same caliber as the ones we were able to have in person.”

The cake auction goes into the nonprofit’s operating budget to help with all of D/SAOC’s programs.

On the plus side, D/SAOC’s golf tournament, its second largest fundraiser each year, did well in an outdoor, socially distanced effort to raise funds for the organization’s Homicide/Other Violent Crimes program.

“Crime doesn’t necessarily stop (during a pandemic), but it makes it more difficult to provide our services,” McBride said. “I think homicide families are struggling.”

That’s especially true given circumstances in which court cases have been backlogged for months after the Iowa Supreme Court repeatedly extended a moratorium on jury trials.

“It’s difficult when (crime victims are) wanting to get closure with the most traumatic event in their life that they couldn’t have anticipated, and it’s just lingering,” said McBride. “Our service can stay connected with those surviving members of violent crimes and be there for them during this extended period of time. We’re going to provide services for them as long as they need them.”

For D/SAOC, the coronavirus posed challenges in determining how to connect with clients in need of services, particularly when many have been told to stay home.

“There are people who, by staying home, it causes more harm to them,” she said of those in abusive relationships. “We’re trying to figure out ways to reach that population, and it’s not an easy thing to do.”

Over the last year, the organization continued to promote its services through social media, community partners and anyone else who victims could potentially cross paths with, so that those in the community know where to send people in need. The organization’s largest amount of clients come from referrals through community partners, law enforcement, businesses, churches, civic groups, physicians and more.

“We do our best to make our services known to all those opportunities, so if they cross paths with someone in need, they can connect them to us,” McBride said.

Over the last year, the organization’s communal shelter capacity has been substantially reduced to promote health and safety during the pandemic. With that, D/SAOC has found other means of services through partners to provide for clients as necessary.

With the stress of COVID-19 compounding the trauma of abuse, victims often come to them in the most exhaustive state, the director said.

“I think 2020 proved how resilient our staff can be,” she said. “I’m very proud to state that our staff were troopers and pulled through and did amazing work, as they are doing today.”