BEND, OR -- A candidate for Oregon Attorney General hosted a meeting in the Old Mill District Thursday focused on domestic violence, child abuse, and sex crimes.

Will Lathrop tells KBND News he wanted to hear from public and private organizations about what's working, and how they struggle. "Bend has a really robust group of organizations that are dealing with things like domestic violence and sexual assault, and homelessness. It also is a manifestation that there are a lot of problems that we need to have that many community-based organizations."

Representatives from CASA – Court Appointed Special Advocates, The Kids Center, M Perfectly, J Bar J Youth Services' AT:project and Human Trafficking Task Force, and Saving Grace attended the roundtable, along with Deschutes County Commission chair Patti Adair.

"This is a group of people that are dedicating their lives to protecting victims and giving service to people that have been victimized sexually or through domestic violence or human trafficking. So, it's a group of like-minded people. I've worked in their industry," the Republican candidate said, adding the theme he kept hearing was the groups are seeing more victims, and require more resources, "The funds are just not adequate. Even some of them mentioned that there's federal or state mandates to do their work but the funds are not there to fully support the work."

Lathrop credits the work Bend groups are doing, and sees it as a model for the state, "There seems to be a collaborative spirit which gives me hope that things can be efficient and we can better serve victims."

The group convened the event to mark October's Domestic Violence Awareness month.

Lathrop is running against Democrat State Representative Dan Rayfield in the race for Oregon Attorney General.