The remainder of the staffmembers of Women’s Crisis Support-Defensa de Mujeres have found themselves in an untenable situation. Stripped of one-third of their budget, they have each taken a 20 percent pay cut and eliminated one-on-one counseling as well as most of their programs for children and youth. Soon the group will stop paying lawyers for women seeking restraining orders to protect them from abusive spouses. And now the group has been forced to close its offices on Friday in Santa Cruz and Watsonville.
Women’s Crisis Support-Defensa de Mujeres serves 1,500 women and children, at a cost of $477,000. The group is now seeking alternative funding and lawyers who will help them out on a pro bono basis. Read more here.
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EarlRichards Fri, Sep 25, 2009 - 10:46 am
Schwarzenegger and the Republican state senators are bad news. It is the government’s duty to protect citizens and to ensure their well-being. Schwarzenegger and the Republican state senators are not doing this. 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, snd the criminals and the murderers out. The Governor’s illegal budget cuts, with the backing of big oil (Chevron Corp. of San Ramon), are very dangerous for women and children who are victims of domestic violence, and it is sub-human. During a recession, with its higher unemployment, government funding for BWS’s should be increased, not eliminated. Obviously, this budget picks-on the most vulnerable, and it endangers children. If a battered wife is murdered in front of a closed-down BWS, then, Schwarzenegger, his oil industry tyrants and the Republican state senators should be charged with first-degree murder.