What Would It Look Like If Public Safety Was Designed With Survivors in Mind?

What would it look like if public safety was designed with survivors in mind?

We ask this not as a slogan—but as a serious political question.
Because the current conversation about “public safety” isn’t working for survivors. In fact, it rarely includes us at all.

Today, when the term public safety comes up, it usually means police. Prisons. Surveillance. It means calls to “crack down,” to end “catch and release,” to protect property, businesses, and public order.

But when we look at safety through the eyes of survivors, that lens doesn’t hold.

At BWSS, we work every day with women, girls, and gender-diverse people who have experienced violence in their homes, on the streets, in relationships, in institutions. We’ve seen how public safety systems were never designed with survivors in mind—and how easily they ignore violence until it spills out in ways too visible to deny.

“We’ve seen what happens when the violence that is ignored in private becomes the violence that erupts in public.”

The truth is, what politicians are now calling “catch and release” has always been the reality for survivors.

They report threats. They request safety plans. They ask for intervention.
And too often, the response is indifference.

Violent men are released. Protection orders are breached. Bail is granted. Risk is minimized.
And when another woman is killed, or a teenage girl is brutally attacked in a public park bathroom, everyone asks: How could this happen?

But survivors already told us.

“I called the police when he threatened to kill me. They said there was nothing they could do.”
“He was already known to them. He had a record. I still had to prove he was dangerous.”

We don’t need more punishment—we need more prevention.
We don’t need more surveillance—we need more response, support, and accountability when survivors come forward.
We don’t need tougher rhetoric—we need a broader definition of what safety really means.

That’s why we’re launching this campaign around a single, urgent question:

What would it look like if public safety was designed with survivors in mind?

We’re not here to offer a tidy answer. We’re here to listen.
To create space for the people who live the consequences of these failures every day to speak.
To imagine beyond what currently exists.

Because survivors already know what real safety feels like—and what its absence costs.

Maybe it looks like housing you can access without fear.
Maybe it looks like a legal system that doesn’t ask you to wait until it’s too late.
Maybe it looks like trauma-informed mental health care that doesn’t require a diagnosis.
Maybe it looks like public space where you aren’t forced to scan for exits every time you leave the house.
Maybe it’s something you’ve never experienced—but still deserve.

We believe the answers to this question already live in our communities.
We believe that public safety must be redefined—not just to include survivors, but to be built around us.

This campaign is your invitation.
To reflect. To speak. To imagine.
To respond with your vision of what safety could and should be.

What would it look like if public safety was designed with survivors in mind?

Tell us. Reflect. Share your vision. You can write, draw, speak, or respond however feels right to you.

Email us at EndingViolence@bwss.org

You can also share publicly using the hashtag #DesignedWithSurvivors and tagging @EndingViolence

Because safety should belong to all of us—and your voice matters

Tag us. Use the hashtag #DesignedWithSurvivors.

We are collecting and amplifying your responses—online, at community events, and through conversations that challenge the narrow frameworks dominating today’s debate.

Because until public safety includes those who have survived violence, it isn’t safety at all.
And until we expand the conversation, we’ll keep missing the point.

Let’s change that—together.