Training has begun in preparation for a new Texas law aimed at increasing awareness and prevention of human trafficking.
“You guys on the front line can make a tremendous difference,” Christy Spralding, a director at the Texas Hotel & Lodging Association, said according to the San Antonio Report. She directed her encouragement toward hotel employees attending human trafficking prevention and reporting training in San Antonio on July 27.
A new Texas law requires the state's motels and hotels to engage in human trafficking prevention and reporting training. It will also require these businesses to post signs with trafficking reporting information visible to employees.
The law takes full effect on Jan. 1, 2022.
Hotel employees are taught to look for evidence of coercion or violence, Carolyn McCall-Squires, director of membership for Texas Hotel & Lodging Association, told the Austin Journal. Employees can also watch for guests who avoid eye contact or arrive with few or no personal possessions. An excessive number of condoms, towels or hotel keys or a constant flow of guests to a room may also signal a trafficking situation to staff.
Employees suspecting a problem are instructed to notify their managers and follow the protocol laid out by employers. For cases involving a minor, authorities must be contacted immediately, McCall-Squires said.
“It is extremely important that Texas hospitality employees be empowered to prevent human trafficking,” McCall-Squires said. “The goal is to eliminate human trafficking and the tragedies associated with these illegal activities.”
Organizations like the Texas Hotel & Lodging Association have long encouraged Texas lawmakers to institute training sessions aimed at human trafficking prevention and reporting, according to the San Antonio Report.
Hotels have been susceptible to human trafficking-related lawsuits in recent years. For example, three Houston-based trafficking victims sued hotel chains in 2019, arguing they did not do enough to prevent trafficking. The new mandatory training for hotel employees is meant to help mitigate such lawsuits.
According to a 2016 University of Texas at Austin report, 78,996 victims of human trafficking ages 23 and younger and 234,457 victims of labor trafficking are in Texas at any given time, totaling 313,453 victims of human trafficking,
The new law, signed by Gov. Greg Abbott on May 18, is one of a handful of measures the Texas Legislature has seen this year aimed at reducing human trafficking. A bill designed to reduce trafficking by registering ATM machines was introduced in the Texas House of Representatives. It advanced to the Senate in May. On June 16, Abbott also signed into law a bill that makes buying sex in Texas a felony.
McCall-Squires believes the newly passed law mandating training will have an impact on Texas communities, significantly reducing human trafficking.
Since 2019, more than 4,000 employees across 700 Texas hotels have completed human trafficking awareness and prevention training through the organization Businesses Ending Slavery and Trafficking, McCall-Squires said. The training is free for all members of the Texas Hotel & Lodging Association.
“When people are called to action and have the resources to make a difference, a difference is made,” McCall-Squires said.