As the Army celebrated its newest sexual assault resource center at Aberdeen Proving Ground on Wednesday, critics said it was the latest example of the military taking only small steps to combat a major problem.
Commanders gathered at the Army installation in Harford County to tour the Sexual Harassment and Assault Response and Prevention Center, which opened in January to house three advocates who guide victims through the process of reporting assaults or harassment.
It's the second of a dozen such centers to open on Army installations worldwide.
"It's designed to be a one-stop place for issues on sexual harassment and assault to be handled," said Greg Mahall, a spokesman for the U.S. Army Communications-Electronics Command, which is based at Aberdeen.
Advocates for victims of sexual assault in the military said the SHARP centers might help, but broader reforms — including taking the decision on whether to prosecute sexual assaults away from commanders — are still needed.
"These centers could be good. They sound like a good step," said retired Air Force Col. Don Christensen, president of the advocacy group Protect Our Defenders. "The problem is, without changing the criminal justice system, the gains we've made are going to be for naught."
The victim-focused centers might encourage more people to come forward to report sexual assault, Christensen said, but they'll just end up in the same flawed military justice system.
Advocacy groups and their allies in Congress are pushing lawmakers to take prosecutions out of the chain of command, where they say the interests of decision-makers are conflicted — and given to independent prosecutors, the system in civilian court.
Their efforts so far have failed. But they are planning another push this year, perhaps as part of a must-pass defense spending bill.
Christensen was chief prosecutor of the Air Force. He said signs of progress such as the SHARP centers shouldn't obscure the bigger picture.
"What I worry about is if they use it to deflect from the real changes we need," he said.
Greg Jacob, policy director for the Service Women's Action Network, raised similar concerns.
"All this stuff that they're doing in terms of prevention and victim response is good, but it's only one half of the equation," said Jacob, a former infantry officer in the Marine Corps. "They really have to make this fundamental change to the system in order to have a viable system."
Without that change, he said, victims will remain reluctant to come forward.
Commanders fielded more than 5,000 reports of sexual assault last year, the Pentagon reported — a 50 percent increase over the previous year. Officials say the increase shows the growing confidence of victims in the military response to sexual assault.
"The instance of sexual harassment and assault has been identified as the Army's No. 1 priority to address," Mahall said. "When you have the breakdowns … of trust in leadership to do the right thing, that's going to impact the readiness."
The victim advocates at Aberdeen's SHARP Center were already employed at the installation before they were consolidated into a single location.
On Wednesday, Army officials held a ribbon-cutting ceremony for the center, located in the soldier support center, as part of the installation's second annual sexual assault prevention summit.
The SHARP centers at Aberdeen and elsewhere have work areas for counselors, criminal investigators and prosecutors.
"It's designed to hopefully be the one place soldiers and civilians alike can get not only education but the whole gamut of services, in the unfortunate event that they are victims," Mahall said.
Wayne Hall, an Army spokesman, said the centers offer streamlined services to make it easier for victims to get help.
"They get a very seasoned, professional team to support them," he said. "They … don't have to go to a half-dozen locations across the installation."
Commanders plan to test the SHARP centers for a year to see how well they work and how much they cost to operate.
Officials said installations considered for SHARP centers were evaluated on factors including sexual assault caseloads, types of services offered, geographic location, and number and type of soldiers stationed.
The other centers are at some of the largest installations in the Army: Fort Bragg, N.C.; Fort Hood, Texas; Joint Base Lewis-McChord, Wash.; Fort Campbell, Ky.; Fort Drum, N.Y.; Fort Riley, Kan.; Schofield Barracks, Hawaii; Fort Sill, Okla.; Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri; Camp Arifjan, Kuwait; and U.S. Army Garrison Kaiserslautern in Germany.
Mahall said Aberdeen's reports of sexual assaults are low, barely one per month. The base employs 22,000 civilians and 2,000 soldiers.
The installation was at the center of a sexual assault scandal in the mid-1990s, when military instructors were accused of sexually assaulting lower-ranking female trainees. A dozen soldiers were charged, and some were sentenced to jail time.
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