Austin News

Attorney General Ken Paxton's Office initiated a Human Trafficking Prevention Coordinating Council to implement a Strategic Plan to combat the state's human trafficking, but before this can be done, the council had to assess the state's current human trafficking infrastructure in order to understand its effectiveness.

The Coordinating Council assessed the state's current infrastructure by conducting a statewide survey to determine the effectiveness of Texas' efforts against human trafficking, according to the Strategic Plan. 

In the survey, data was collected from individuals and stakeholders that deal directly with human trafficking, such as prevention groups and programs, victim-helping organizations, advocacy groups, state agencies, law enforcement, health care and several others, according to the plan. 

The council collected responses from 2,188 respondents in March 2020 and put the information together to create a "snapshot" of the current human trafficking infrastructure. Putting this data together will helped the council create a basis for their Strategic Plan. 

In the survey, data showed that the most commonly encountered human trafficking is labor trafficking for adults 18 and older, respondents said. Following labor trafficking, child sex trafficking (under 18 years old) is the second most common, then adult sex trafficking (18 years old or older) and lastly child labor trafficking (under 18 years old), the data shows. 

These areas are where much of prevention funding is put toward, however, many of these prevention efforts receive little to no funding, according to survey data. Those that do receive little funding get it from the federal or state government, municipalities, private foundation or individual donations. 

While many organizations use funding to help victims, most of them contact law enforcement when they receive a tip on human trafficking, data shows. Over 300 of the respondents said they contact law enforcement. Others said they contact a regional hotline, national hotline, DFPS, regional care provider or 911, according to the data. 

Most of survey respondents also did not provide internal human trafficking training within the last year. According to the data, less than half of all respondents provide this kind of training to employees.