California restores domestic violence shelter funding
Published: October 21, 2009
Updated: October 22, 2009
California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger signed a bill to restore $ 16.3 million to domestic violence shelters today.
CODEPINK, an anti-war female advocacy group, cancelled “A Walk in her Shoes”—a rally they planned to hold at Los Angeles’ Town Hall on Friday—in protest of the Governor’s decision to gut funding for shelters last July.
After Gov. Schwarzenegger line-item vetoed all public funding for domestic abuse programs this summer, six shelters in the state closed. Others scaled back the hours they provided services or cut staff.
Money from a vehicle technology fund–that California will have to find a way to repay in 3 years—will refund the shelters.
Introduced by Senator Leland Yee (D-San Francisco), the bill received the support of 2,600 people who joined a SAVE Domestic Violence Shelters Facebook page.
The musician Moby, who’s mother is a survivor of domestic abuse, voiced his support of the bill at three California concerts this week. He donated the proceeds to shelters in the state.
Gov. Schwarzenegger hardly championed the bill as a measure that would provide domestic abuse centers long-term financial security.
“We’re working on it right now and we’re going to find a creative solution to make sure of a permanent solution for this,” he told the Inland News Today.
In a message sent to individuals on their e mail list, CODEPINK wrote this afternoon: “We will begin dialoguing and researching what actions will help make this funding permanent – as this bill is a one-time measure – and will call the group together again to work on that.”
Funding for battered women shelters should have never been vetoed in the first place, because most women are smaller than men.
Earl,
I agree, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger was wrong to cut funding for domestic violence shelters this summer. But not because some women happen to be smaller than some men. The state ought provide resources to all individuals subjected to violence and trauma regardless of their size, or their gender identity. Men are victims of domestic violence too.
Katie
Katie:
The function of any government is to provide law and order and to protect citizens. The funding priority for battered women shelters (BWS) should be the same as for prisons, because human life is at risk. Prisons keep the criminals and the murderers in and BWS’s keep the good people in, and the criminals and the murderers out. The funding for BWS, should come from taxes, the same taxes that support prisons, because BWS’s stop citizens from being killed. There are Salvation Army-type homeless shelters for the very few men who are victims of domestic violence.
Earl
Battered women should be able to feel supported by the government, not like they have to battle for their rights. Daily life for an absued woman can be a battle enough in itself, without feeling that they have to fight the government for what they should be entitled to.