JANUARY 15, 2025 – For the first time in the Army’s history, effective Feb. 10, the Army will have its own standalone regulation for sexual harassment and assault response and prevention, Army Regulation 600-52, and units across Europe are preparing to support the new regulation, now.
Prior to this, SHARP fell under Army Regulation 600-20, Army Command Policy, and according to one of the 21st Theater Sustainment Command sexual assault response coordinators, Laiza Correa Sboron, SHARP was only a small portion of that regulation.
“The new regulation – Sexual Harassment/Assault Response and Prevention Program – is a big deal,” said Sboron, who is assigned to 21st TSC and embedded with the 405th Army Field Support Brigade. “The SHARP program now has its own standalone regulation, AR 600-52, and it’s bringing significant changes – to include the expansion of a full-time SHARP staff, optimal victim assistance and reporting opportunities, and expert support to the commanders with the oversight needed to execute the program.”
Sboron said as a direct result of the incident at Fort Hood, Texas, involving Spc. Vanessa Guillén in 2020 and the I am Vanessa Guillén Act of 2021, a series of program and policy changes were implemented, one of the biggest being the new regulation.
“We’ve been waiting on it for about two and a half year, now,” said Sboron. “In the meantime, the SHARP team has been getting together weekly, reviewing the new regulation, going over it, and clarifying any gray areas so that we’re fully prepared on 10 February when it takes effect.”
In addition, at Army headquarters, Sboron said there’s a program called SHARP Talk where SHARP professionals across the Army attend via remote chat, audio and video using MS Teams. At 21st TSC, Sboron and other SHARP professionals there put together a list of questions or requests for additional information, then raise them up through U.S. Army Europe and Africa to be proposed during the Army-level SHARP Talk sessions.
With the new regulation and new structure, called the installation model, there are supervisory Sexual Assault Response Coordinators, or supervisory SARCs, as well as embedded SARCs down to the brigade level. In addition, some brigades have victim advocates assigned, and some units still have uniformed collateral duty SHARP Soldiers. All of them are considered SHARP professionals.
“But it’s really important to understand that one of the new changes involves going 100 percent civilian by 2027,” said Sboron. “Most of those Soldiers who are collateral duty SHARP representatives are going to be phased out and only a handful will remain based on deployments and things like that.”
According to the Army’s Directorate of Prevention, Resilience and Readiness the mission of SHARP is to enhance Army readiness through the prevention of sexual assault, sexual harassment and associated retaliatory behaviors while providing comprehensive response capabilities.
“Most importantly, we work hard on that P part of the SHARP program, which is prevention, and we strive to eradicate sexual harassment and assault across the United States Army,” Sboron said.
The new SHARP regulation, AR 600-52, can be viewed and read in full on the Army Publishing Directorate’s official website.
The 405th AFSB is assigned to U.S. Army Sustainment Command and headquartered in Kaiserslautern, Germany. The brigade provides materiel enterprise support to U.S. forces throughout Europe and Africa – providing theater sustainment logistics; synchronizing acquisition, logistics and technology; and leveraging the AMC materiel enterprise to support joint forces. For more information on the 405th AFSB, visit the official website and the official Facebook site.
By Cameron Porter
405th AFSB Public Affairs Officer