By Khalida Sarwari
Last November, human trafficking made front page news when three San Jose residents were arrested for bringing over people from Spain to work against their will at TapaOle on Cox Avenue and Utopik Salon on Saratoga-Sunnyvale Road. But the human trafficking epidemic was here long before that and continues to persist, according to an expert on the subject.
The Saratoga Foothill Club has invited Betty Ann Boeving, founder and executive director of Bay Area Anti-Trafficking Coalition, to speak on the issue as part of its annual lecture series on Jan. 20. The group she leads helps people and civic and nonprofit groups fight human trafficking regionally and beyond.
Boeving said she plans to discuss the full scope of human trafficking in the U.S., which in addition to sex slavery includes forced labor, domestic servitude and consumer choices that impact child labor practices overseas. Her mission, she said, is to raise awareness about human trafficking and secondly, to empower people to do something about it.
“Really, in the work that we do, probably the most eye-opening thing to happen [to people] is when a case happens in their own back yard, and then [they] are ready to act; they’re ready to say, ‘What can I do?’ ” said Boeving.
During her talk, she’ll dispel four myths that many people believe about the transportation of people for the purposes of forced sex or labor: that it happens in other countries and not domestically, that it happens to girls and not boys, that it’s just sexual exploitation and not forced labor and lastly, that it is an issue that affects foreign nationals and not Americans. All of these myths couldn’t be further from the truth, she said, and the statistics prove it.
“On average, there are 300,000 youth in America at risk of being trafficked,” she said. “It’s ‘Romeo pimps,’ kids coming out of broken homes or foster care and next thing you know they are approached by someone who says, ‘Hey you’re beautiful,’ or, ‘I’ll buy you something,’ and flips the switch on them.”
At the end of her talk, Boeving will take questions from her audience and share simple tips they can use to help chip away at the issue. Along with the number for the national hotline where people can report instances of human trafficking, she’ll also inform people about assessing the businesses behind the products they purchase that might be contributing to the problem and how to spot signs of exploitation at coffee shops, nail salons, massage parlors and hotels and restaurants.
“It’s when you go to the park and you see a nanny and you talk to her and she seems disheveled,” said Boeving. “It’s looking at nail salons and every time you ask, [the technician] can’t tell you where she lives. The fact is they’re held captive in salons and sleep there at night.”
Boeving has been involved in efforts to combat human trafficking since 2002 and has worked for organizations such as International Justice Mission. She founded BAATC in 2011 with colleague Brian Wo with the goal of serving as an umbrella organization for the 50 or so anti-human trafficking organizations in the Bay Area so that they can work conjointly to ultimately end the epidemic.
Numerous media reports have indicated that the Super Bowl tends to be one of the biggest human trafficking events in the country, so to curb the trafficking of people for forced sex and labor ahead of the Super Bowl in Santa Clara next month, local organizations will be training personnel at all three Bay Area airports during the week of Jan. 11 to look for potential victims, said Boeving.
Aside from her work on this issue, she has been an announcer for the Stanford University women’s basketball team for 17 years and now also announces the men’s basketball games. She holds an advanced degree in international policy studies from Stanford.
The lecture starts at 7:30 p.m. and will take place at the Saratoga Foothill Club, 20399 Park Place, Saratoga. Tickets are $10. For more information about the work that BAATC does, visit baatc.org.
