Geovany Brown, a Jamestown High School senior, is pictured with fellow high school students and state Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli at the Angelo Del Toro Puerto Rican/Hispanic Youth Leadership Institute, held alongside the annual SOMOS Conference in San Juan.

Too many calls to New York’s domestic violence hotline are going unanswered, or aren’t answered quickly enough, according to a recent state Comptroller’s Office audit.

State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli recently released the results of an audit of the state’s domestic violence hotline operated by the state Office for the Prevention of Domestic Violence (OPDV). DiNapoli’s audit found significant issues that limited the hotline’s effectiveness. Auditors made 25 test calls and sent 20 text and 20 web-based messages between December 2024 to June 2025. Of those, 20% of the calls were never connected to a representative. Of the text messages, 15% went unanswered and 30% took longer than 30 seconds to respond as required by the contract between OPDV and the service provider. A review of 60-days of call logs showed that of the 2,814 calls made to the hotline, 170 (6%) were not connected.

Proper translation was also a problem, the audit found. Auditors sent 12 texts and eight web-based messages in six languages other than English. Their review determined 25% of the messages were either mistranslated or not translated at all.

“When a victim reaches out to the state’s domestic violence hotline, they expect someone to be on the other end to help. It can be a life-or-death situation, which is why these lapses are so troubling,” said DiNapoli. “The Office for the Prevention of Domestic Violence responded positively to the audit and acted on our recommendations, and it should continue shoring up critical programs and services so New Yorkers get the timely help they need.”

The Office for the Prevention of Domestic Violence said in a reply to the audit that it had strengthened quality assurance by testing the hotline through both the vendor that operates it as well as state officials, with a 2025-28 Hotline Contract Workplan created that includes more detailed performance measures around hotline operator response times to phone calls, chats or text contacts as well as language translation services.

OPDV’s role is to advance public education and outreach, provide training and technical assistance, monitor data, report on programs and policies, and coordinate the state agencies that administer programs and services related to domestic and gender-based violence. This includes oversight of a confidential support hotline that is managed by a private contractor. OPDV also serves as chair of the Domestic Violence Advisory Council (DVAC); oversees state agency implementation of requirements for gender-based violence policies and procedures; and publishes a gender-based violence data dashboard.

The audit found that DVAC, which brings together key state agencies and advocacy organizations, generally met twice a year as required, but only four of the 17 members attended all meetings, with three attending less than half. While these meetings facilitated information sharing and communication, DVAC did not meet its mandate to make domestic violence-related recommendations to the Executive or the Legislature and did not help stakeholders develop policies and priorities for effective domestic violence intervention, public education or advocacy.

The audit also found that OPDV could more effectively inform decision-making and policy development by improving the timeliness and consistency of data collected for its data dashboard, which serves as the state’s primary mechanism for reporting statewide domestic violence data.