People seeking a domestic abuse or harassment restraining order can now start the petition from a phone instead of a courthouse counter. Green Bay advocates say it saves time and lowers risk, while the federal money behind victim services keeps shrinking.
People seeking a domestic abuse or harassment restraining order anywhere in Wisconsin can now fill out and file the petition from a phone or laptop, without first picking up paper forms at a courthouse, after the Wisconsin Court System opened an online portal in all 72 counties on Sept. 1.1 Brown County was one of eight counties that tested it over the summer, along with Adams, Barron, Dane, Kenosha, Milwaukee, Sauk and Waukesha.1,2 During the July and August pilot, 72 petitions came in through the portal and 122 advocates, clerks, court officials and police received hands-on training.1
The court system announced the statewide rollout Oct. 1, the first day of Domestic Violence Awareness Month.1 The portal is at ro.wicourts.gov. Chief Justice Jill Karofsky said, "It takes an act of courage to file for a restraining order."3
The portal walks a petitioner through the forms in plain language, then generates the standard court documents and submits them directly to the local circuit court.1,4 Filers can create an eFiling account or prepare the forms without one.1 It runs on phones as well as computers, and includes a "safe exit" button for someone who thinks they're being watched.1,5 Filing a domestic abuse petition costs nothing, according to the state court website.3
The portal handles only domestic abuse and harassment temporary restraining orders. Child abuse and individual-at-risk petitions still have to be filed on paper or through the regular circuit court eFiling system.1 A temporary order generally lasts less than two weeks and is often granted on an emergency basis ahead of an injunction hearing,3 and petitioners still have to appear before a judge at that hearing.2,5
Golden House, the Green Bay domestic abuse shelter and counseling agency, helps people fill out restraining order paperwork two to three times a week, associate director Stephanie Prevost told FOX 11.2 Under the paper process, she said, petitioners had to handle a stack of forms and visit three different offices in the Brown County Courthouse before the sheriff's office served the order.2
Prevost said the online version saves time, is more confidential and is less intimidating, and that skipping the courthouse trip lowers the risk that an abuser follows the victim there.2 The time saved lets advocates spend more of each meeting on next steps, she said. Golden House still recommends filing with an advocate even though the portal is easy to use.2
Advocates in other pilot counties reported similar results. Krystal Chase of The Women's Center in Waukesha said petitioners found it "a lot easier than they thought it would be," and her staff saw a significant drop in the time it took to complete a petition.1 Robin Dalton, legal services director at End Domestic Abuse Wisconsin, noted that survivors can now file at any hour of the day.3
Wisconsin built the portal as one of three "learner courts" in a national project on remote civil protection orders, funded by the U.S. Department of Justice Office on Violence Against Women and run by the National Center for State Courts.1,6 Wisconsin's share of that grant was $138,500.3 Innovation for Justice's UX for Justice program helped design it.6
Domestic violence deaths in Wisconsin dipped last year from a record. End Domestic Abuse Wisconsin counted 101 deaths related to domestic and family violence in 2025, including 60 domestic violence homicide victims.7 That's down from 110 deaths in 2024, the highest total since the coalition began tracking in 2000. Firearms were used in 71% of the 2024 deaths.8
A faster form doesn't replace the advocates who help people through it, and part of their funding comes from the federal Victims of Crime Act fund, which is paid for by fines and penalties in federal criminal cases.9 That fund fell 90% from fiscal 2017 to fiscal 2024, according to the federal Office for Victims of Crime, and more than 100 Wisconsin nonprofits took a 70% cut in their VOCA grants in a single year, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported.9 Wisconsin victim service providers typically draw about 20% of their budgets from VOCA.9
In Green Bay, Wise Women Gathering Place lost $300,000 in VOCA funding.9 Statewide, Legal Aid Wisconsin said it had turned away more than 1,000 people seeking help after the cuts began hitting in 2024.10 The U.S. House passed a bipartisan stopgap by voice vote that would steer False Claims Act penalties into the VOCA fund through 2029, with five of Wisconsin's eight House members, including Republican Rep. Tony Wied, as cosponsors.9
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