Tag Archives: domestic violence

Make A Father’s Day Declaration

I invite you to join me in making the following declaration:

I declare here and now I believe in respect. I am a person ready to take a stand against relationship violence and abuse. I want all to know this symbolizes my commitment to solve problems through conversation, not confrontation. Together we can teach others to lift their hands in embrace, not in anger. We can show compassion equals strength, and by doing so, help shape a world free of relationship violence.

To declare it, go here.

After you declare it, share it.

The Family Violence Prevention Fund is on a mission to create a future of healthy relationships. And as such, they are asking people to Give RESPECT!, and make a declaration.

So far, mostly women have signed. Women should sign, and I'm asking the men to step up. Relationship violence is a problem that lives in the shadows. To end it, we must bring it into the light and talk about it. You can help by making the declaration, and sending it on.

And to the women reading this, please sign the declaration too and send it to the men you know, and ask them to make a stand.

After all, what is it to be a man?

It's not measured by the size of your wallet, but by the size of your heart.
It's not determined by the strength of your muscles, but by the strength of your courage.
It's not judged by how tall you stand, but by what you stand up for.

And this Father's Day, it's time to man up.

Will You Lift A Finger To Help End Relationship Abuse And Violence? Ne-Yo Did.

I have learned a lot recently about how heartbreaking relationship abuse and violence is. How it can destroy smart intelligent women and their daughters and their families. And how it can be stopped but often only after unconscionable destruction and despair.

I have also learned the best way to stop relationship abuse and violence is to stop it from happening in the first place; and the first place to start that process is our children.

San Franciso-based, Family Violence Prevention Fund (FVPF), has been a leader in the fight towards creating a world where each of us can live free of violence. For over two decades, FVPF has been organizing programs and campaigns to prevent violence within the home and in the community, as well as provide aid to those whose lives have already been devastated by violence. The Give RESPECT! Campaign is a smart, strong campaign designed to help the next generation understand how to treat their fellow man.

“Let's teach children that violence does not equal strength. Let's help daughters and sons find their voice to never stand for abuse. We're for teaching children to solve problems through conversation not confrontation.”

When I look at my daughter, I just think how much I want her to be happy and healthy and learn what love really is, and how to live well with others. When I look at my son, I hope he is learning the right ways to communicate and treat others in his life.

The Give RESPECT! Campaign is partially funded by Macy's to their great credit, and now Ne-Yo has stepped up as well. He has recorded a special song called “Heroes” and this is where you come in.

If you click here, you can download the song for absolutely free. FREE.

And Macy's will donate a dollar to the RESPECT! Campaign.

It's really that simple. But here's the catch. We only have to March 31, 2010 to get 50,000 downloads or a $50,000 donation to the Campaign from Macy's.

Please.

Download this. Then Tweet it. Facebook it. Anything you can to help spread the word would be greatly appreciated.

Respecting each other, respecting our life partners and most importantly, helping make sure our children live better, safer lives, and all you have to do is get a free song to start helping? Seems like a pretty good deal to me.

Domestic Violence Bill Heads to Governor: Can He Match Moby?

A couple of weeks ago, Dave wrote about Moby’s work to prevent murder and domestic violence in support of a bill by Senator Leland Yee.  Moby’s concert tomorrow at the Warfield in San Francisco will benefit domestic violence shelters.

This week, Senator Yee has made some progress on his front. His bill to earmark money from the crime victims fund for domestic violence shelters has gotten one step closer to reality.

The emergency bill authorized the transfer of $16.3 million to domestic violence shelters. While it doesn’t sound like much, it will likely be enough to keep many of them running through the year.

“Governor Schwarzenegger has put women and children at risk; he will now have a second chance to do the right thing,” said Yee.  “Each passing day only results in the closing of more domestic violence shelters and victims facing homelessness or returning to their abuser.”

“In order to keep the remaining domestic violence shelters open, it is absolutely vital that the Governor immediately sign this bill into law,” said Yee.  “Failure to do so will only result in increased health care, law enforcement and other costs to the state. But more critically, it puts victims of domestic violence and their children in grave danger.”

Schwarzenegger has said that he’s not inclined to sign the bill as the fund is heading towards depletion, but Arnold isn’t known as a man who gets himself dead set on anything.  We’ll see if he takes the initiative to help prevent some very serious crimes.

Moby Doing More To Stop Murder In California Than Arnold Schwarzenegger

Musical artist Moby has decided to donate 100% of the proceeds of three upcoming concerts in California, totaling anywhere from $75,000 to $100,000, to help out domestic violence shelters who saw their state funding cut by Governor Schwarzenegger back in July.

Six shelters that temporarily house victims and their families have closed since Schwarzenegger used his line-item veto to eliminate their funding in July. Advocates say dozens more of the 94 agencies that received a total of $20.4 million in state money last year have scaled back services and cuts hours and staff.

“In the grand scheme of things, it’s not a lot of money,” Moby said about the cuts during a phone interview from Chicago. “But it’s going to directly harm the women who benefit from these programs.”

Moby, whose real name is Richard Melville Hall, said he hopes to generate $75,000 to $100,000 from dates in San Diego, Los Angeles and San Francisco from Oct. 12 through 15 to give to the California Partnership to End Domestic Violence.

“My mother was in a long relationship with a guy who was very, very abusive and at one point I had to stop him from stabbing her to death,” Moby said.

The money will go to the California Partnership to End Domestic Violence.

Domestic violence shelters are nothing more than homicide prevention units.  Schwarzenegger’s cuts – made by blue pencil after the Legislature passed a budget agreement – caused a huge threat to public safety that could cost more in court and law enforcement money in the long run.  Republicans like him probably think that, as long as charitable donations have stepped into the breach, the state can be absolved for their efforts to threaten women’s lives.  But the $100,000, while extremely generous, is just a small fraction of the money that was cut.

Maybe some other celebrity could hold events with the proceeds going to domestic violence shelters.  Maybe someone who had a long movie career and has a legion of adoring fans.  Or maybe we can fund government properly and we wouldn’t have to hold fundraisers to save women from being beaten or killed.

Yacht Party Hijackers

George Skelton finds a nut:

The two-thirds rule is not used merely to protect taxpayers from politicians trying to reach deeper into their pockets. It’s used by special interests — mainly big business — to game the system; a tool handy for legislative leverage, or extortion. If you don’t give us what we want, we’ll withhold the votes needed for the two-thirds.

It’s about buying and selling. Last Friday, at the all-night windup of this year’s regular legislative session, Democrats weren’t in a buying mood.

This is what happened, according to Democrats, and Republicans aren’t exactly denying it: The Senate GOP blocked more than 20 bills requiring a two-thirds vote because Democrats wouldn’t cave on three unrelated demands.

This has been true for years if not decades.  The 2/3 rule does not protect tax increases, it’s a tool for the Yacht Party to hijack the process.  In this case, the GOP wanted to create a forced market for Intuit, makers of TurboTax; to increase the corporate tax breaks from the Februrary budget deal, in particular to help Chevron; and to make Roy Ashburn a lead author on a Democratic bill.  See if you can find the word “tax increase” in there.  But because the Democrats didn’t much feel like giving out even more corporate welfare or fattening the pockets of Intuit, the Yacht Party revolted.  And they knocked down 20 bills, including one that would keep domestic violence shelters open throughout the state (which is nothing more than homicide prevention) by shifting available funds, and another to allow the Treasurer more leeway to renegotiate with banks and save the state $850 million dollars.

These and the other bills, again, did not involve tax increases.  They were taken up under urgency requirements (so the policy takes effect immediately) or other factors, like changes to the budget, which necessitate a 2/3 vote.  And the Yacht Party routinely takes advantage of this, mainly out of spite and an attempt to leverage their votes to reward their corporate backers.

Ashburn candidly defends blocking the legislation: “This was an opportunity for Republicans to have some leverage.” Concerning the merits of measures buried in the fallout: “The subject matter of bills at that point was secondary to what the [GOP] caucus had decided to do with them.”

This is a pretty startling admission.  But not one anybody wasn’t aware of before now.

Skelton has deciphered the problem pretty clearly, and Democrats are well-positioned to highlight it and show the disaster of governance ushered in by the onerous 2/3 rules.

Will they?

Putting Politics Over the Lives of Californians

The session ended early Saturday morning in a fit of panicked voting and negotiations. To put it mildly, there were a lot of questions left unanswered, and a lot of things left undone.  Some of these uncompleted items will leave Californians in serious danger.

As the session was drawing towards a close, the Yacht Party Senators collectively said they would not vote for any supermajority measures unless some of their own proposals, already defeated, were resurrected.  It is just another example of the Yacht Party using their minority veto to impose policies rejected by large majorities of the state. It is an act of political ransom, and entirely unacceptable.

However, this act has real consequences. Specifically, I point to the domestic violence shelters that Dave mentioned last week. Senator Yee’s bill to take $16 million from non-general fund monies for the shelters was nearly unanimously approved by the assembly. However when it returned to the Senate for concurrence of a few minor changes, the Senate Republicans refused to support a measure they had only a few days ago supported.

“I am deeply disappointed that petty Sacramento politics and end-of session drills were put before the lives of victims,” said Yee.  “It was absolutely vital to approve this legislation.  Failure to pass this bill only puts more lives at risk.  I will reintroduce this bill again and again and again until we finally save our domestic violence shelters.  Anything less is irresponsible, and not only increases health care and law enforcement costs, but puts victims and their children in grave danger.”

Sen. Yee understates with “deeply disappointed.”  

Remember These Moments

True to the reality of a weak political media and an inattentive public, the chatter over the results of the July budget revision, despite major cuts to the social safety net, has completely subsided.  No taxes got increased and nobody “important” got hurt, so it was just time to move on.  Politicians just move on to the business of raising corporate money, special interests can move on to the business of writing laws that help their bottom line, and everybody in Sacramento can praise everybody else for “sacrificing” to get things done.  

Only, for the people living under the consequences of these budgets, created through a choice not to properly pay for needed services, the budget battle is not forgotten.  And it doesn’t consist of a group of numbers in a column.  It’s entirely real and it hits them every single day.  Here’s just one example.

Six domestic violence shelters in California have been forced to close while dozens more are scaling back services after Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger eliminated all state funding for the program that supports them.

Shelters in the Central Valley town of Madera, the Sierra foothill town of Grass Valley and in Ventura County in Southern California have closed. Others in the San Francisco Bay area, Los Angeles and Bakersfield are on the verge of closing.

Many centers are laying off staff and closing satellite offices that serve remote areas of the state as they cope with the budget cuts. A national domestic violence group describes California’s as the deepest cuts to such programs nationwide, even as other states have reduced funding.

In Madera County, officials have turned away six domestic violence victims and eight children since the county’s only shelter closed Aug. 7, said Tina Figueroa, the shelter’s director. The Martha Diaz Shelter served about 100 victims a year, many of them low-income and with no place else to turn, she said.

So 100 victims of domestic violence in smallish Madera County now have truly nowhere to turn, and will either suffer under the boot of their abusive partners or, in many cases, be killed by them.  The director of domestic violence policy in the LA City Attorney’s office pretty clearly calls these programs “homicide prevention.”  It also saves money relative to what you spend prosecuting the eventual homicides.  I’ve seen “tough on crime” conservatives over the years invoke the name of victims and stir up public support for laws in their name.  They go curiously silent when hundreds of domestic violence victims are put at risk of death because they want to save rich people and corporations from having to pay for their fair share of the commons.

These closures are the direct result of line-item cuts by the Governor.  So the blood is on his hands.  Leland Yee has a bill that attempts to cover the domestic violence shelter budget with cash from a crime victims fund, but under 2/3 rules, it’s not likely to pass this week.

Kudos to the AP for doing a story on this; but there need to be many more.  There’s a human face on the budget cuts that has completely been lost and forgotten.  Those suffering are right to suspect that nobody in Sacramento cares about them.

Yee authors bill to save domestic violence shelters

One of the tragedies of the budget “deal” was that many domestic violence shelters’ budgets were dramatically slashed.  Many of them would simply have no other choice than closing their doors either permanently or for part of the year.  Obviously, this is a dangerous “solution” that emerged from the minds in the Horseshoe.

Sen. Leland Yee (D-SF/Peninsula), on the other hand, was no huge budget supporter. He voted for a handful of the bills, but voted No more than most senators.  And then Governor Tuffy McBloodyHands decides to veto funding completely for 94 centers.  Now, this may or may not be legal, but something needs to change.  Thinking about this horrible disaster forced him to work on some other solutions.  He thinks he’s on to one with a bill he’s bringing to the legislature.

“I don’t know why he did it. This puts kids and moms at risk,” said state Sen. Leland Yee, D-San Francisco/San Mateo.

The program faced a 20 percent budget reduction before Schwarzenegger completely eliminated funding for 94 domestic violence shelters in the state.

“It is absolutely vital that we keep domestic violence shelters open,” said Yee, who voted against cuts to the domestic violence program. The veto increases health care, law enforcement and other costs to the state and puts victims of domestic violence and their children in grave danger, he said. …

Yee said his legislation allocates $16.3 million from the victims’ compensation fund, with a current balance of $136 million, to the Domestic Violence Program. (San Mateo Daily Journal 8/5/09)

Hopefully this is an urgency measure, but the Governor’s people are saying that the fund is being spent at a pace that it will be gone by 2012.  Yee debates those figures, but I’m sure the Legislative Analyst will have something to say on this one.

The Lack Of Investment, Protecting The Rich And Connected

It’s hard to choose the most cruel or the most thoughtless among Arnold Schwarzenegger’s line-item cuts added to the budget revision.  But you could make a case for the slashing of all state funding for domestic violence centers, for a savings of about $16 million dollars.  LAist profiles one center, in the Santa Clarita Valley, that will probably now have to close:

The Domestic Violence Center in the Santa Clarita Valley is the only agency that provides domestic violence services in the 200-square mile valley. As a result of Schwarzenegger’s cut, which is immediate, they’ve lost 45%, or $207,222.00, of their annual funding, which they say will force them to close their doors later this year unless the community supports them with donations. In 2008, they served over 1,000 victims of domestic violence.

“As the Center’s Executive Director, I think about every client who has come through our doors and their horrific stories of abuse – I cannot help but cry when I think about what the loss of our services will mean to victims,” said Executive Director Nicole Shellcroft in a statement. “Those who walk through our doors have suffered through broken bones, beatings, strangulation, food deprivation, arson, torture, genital mutilation and unspeakable sexual violence. They have been thrown down flights of stairs, have been victim to violent physical attacks during pregnancy and have even faced the prospect of murder. Victims seek our services to escape incredible violence aimed at them and their children.”

Here’s another profile, from Oroville in Butte County.

This is what we are talking about when we say that people will die from the decisions made by Arnold Schwarzenegger and the Legislature.  The $16 million in cuts represent a pittance of the budget and far less than the $2 billion dollar annual tax cut for the largest corporations in America instituted back in February.  But, we are told, those businesses would flee the state if they were forced to contribute a fair share of taxes for the commons that they use, so instead, women and their children will have practically nowhere to turn to save themselves from spousal abuse.

It turns out that some businesses are dismayed enough to consider leaving California – not because of the lack of tax breaks, because of all of the budget cuts and the impact on the workforce.

Wilbur D.Curtis invented the globular glass coffeepot, that staple of coffee counters everywhere, in 1940. Since then his son and grandsons have turned Wilbur Curtis Co. into a manufacturing concern that earns revenue approaching $100 million by turning out commercial coffee brewing equipment from a sprawling factory in Montebello.

But their long history in California doesn’t exempt the Curtis family from the costs and hassles that give this state its reputation as one of the hardest places in the country to do business […]

Yet it’s plain that the state government has failed in precisely those areas where it can make a difference. Laws’ main concern isn’t strictly how much money the state spends — it’s that the bucks don’t go where they count.

His two biggest issues are education and infrastructure. “We pay a fortune here to educate people on basic things like writing and math skills that they should have learned in high school,” he says. The company, whose workforce is mostly Latino, also provides training in English as a second language — including for some employees who came through the public schools […]

Then there’s that lifeblood of any firm whose products can’t be shipped through cyberspace — transport.

Traffic congestion in the L.A. basin has become a round-the-clock hassle. Laws says one of his biggest customers, a coffee company with a national reach, opened a local facility here to be near its own big customers, only to find that navigating the overstressed road system drove its costs to twice its expectations.

And these complaints about infrastructure and education exist before budget revisions that would decimate the future of higher education for a generation of students, and only harm the ability to create the infrastructure necessary for densely populated areas in the 21st century.

We’re picking away at safety net programs and increasing the danger and suffering for a whole class of citizens, while protecting the largest corporations and the wealthiest campaign contributors.  And the actual lifeblood of job creation, the small business community, would rather see investment than the current hijacking of state government by those who want to dismantle it.

Related: Marc Cooper’s cover story on California at The Nation.

An end to the practice of incarcerating domestic violence victims

Under current law, prosecutors can incarcerate domestic violence victims to make them testify against the perpetrator.  Unfortunately, this has the effect of scaring many victims out of testifying. The practice was previously banned for sexual assault victims. Well, today, consider that practice an historical one for domestic violence victims as well:

Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger (R-Los Angeles) today signed into law a bill that victim advocates believe will result in more women coming forward to law enforcement after falling victim to domestic violence.  Senate Bill 1356, authored by Senator Leland Yee (D-San Francisco/San Mateo), protects domestic violence survivors from the threat of incarceration when they refuse to testify against their abuser in court.   The law mirrors an existing statute for sexual assault victims.

Full Press release over the flip

SACRAMENTO – Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger (R-Los Angeles) today signed into law a bill that victim advocates believe will result in more women coming forward to law enforcement after falling victim to domestic violence.  Senate Bill 1356, authored by Senator Leland Yee (D-San Francisco/San Mateo), protects domestic violence survivors from the threat of incarceration when they refuse to testify against their abuser in court.   The law mirrors an existing statute for sexual assault victims.

“I am very pleased to see the Governor and my colleagues on both sides of the aisle support this commonsense and much-needed legislation,” said Yee.  “Domestic violence survivors have been through enough; the last thing they need is to be re-victimized by our legal system or be exposed to threats of incarceration.  This law is not going to result in fewer prosecutions, but instead just the opposite.  Survivors are more likely to report incidents of domestic violence when they trust law enforcement and our system of justice.”

In fact, in a letter regarding another bill before the Legislature in 1991, then Los Angeles District Attorney Ira Reiner agreed with Yee and victim advocates.  The letter from Reiner’s special counsel John Lovell stated, “Prosecutors who raise the spectra of possible incarceration of victim/witnesses diminish the credibility of the criminal justice system as an effective instrument in combating domestic violence.  The unintended consequence of those types of warnings is a chilling constraint on victim/witnesses to come forward in these types of cases at all.”

“SB 1356 ensures that victims of domestic violence have the same statutory protections as sexual assault victims and exempts them from the threat of being incarcerated for refusal to testify against their perpetrators,” said Schwarzenegger.  “Domestic violence victims, like many sexual assault victims, are victimized by perpetrators they know, and experience similar psychological trauma and fear of retribution from the abuser or the abuser’s family members.”

“Coercion is a draconian practice that should not be used in getting a victim to testify after just facing a similar control tactic from her abuser,” said Yee.  “Instead, prosecutors should work with advocates in getting the victim to a place where she is comfortable and willing to testify, which in turn will result in a much more successful prosecution.  SB 1356 also rightfully considers the children in domestic violence cases, who will no longer be put at risk of losing both parents and being unfairly pushed into foster care.”

Since 1991, sexual assault victims have not faced imprisonment if they decide not to testify in a criminal case, whereas domestic violence victims under a second contempt charge have been subject to incarceration.  This law was tested in 2005, when the district attorney in San Mateo County pursued and a judge ordered jail time to a victim for refusing to testify against her abuser.  The state appeals court later dissolved the contempt charge due to the fact that the case was already prosecuted and resulted in a guilty verdict without the victim’s testimony.

“I felt that the system had given up on me,” said Katina Britt, the victim in the case.  “The district attorney did not protect me, even though I was a victim of a serious bodily injury crime.  The DA wanted to victimize me once more and the court willingly obliged.  I wish I had the protection sought by Senator Yee’s bill.”

“It is improper and unjust to hold the victim personally responsible for winning a guilty verdict against the batterer,” said Yee.  “There is no evidence to suggest that forced testimony leads to higher conviction rates.  It is unconscionable that survivors of domestic violence have faced such threats and even more disturbing that some have been dealt jail sentences after falling victim to something out of their control.”

“As the state domestic violence coalition, our primary concern is for victims’ safety,” said Marivic Mabanag, Executive Director of the California Partnership to End Domestic Violence.  “It is the victims themselves who are in the best position to judge when testifying against their abusers might pose a serious threat to themselves or their children.”

In addition to the California Partnership to End Domestic Violence, the bill was supported by the California Coalition Against Sexual Assault, California Psychiatric Association, California Protective Parents Association, California Public Defenders Association, Crime Victims United, Equality California, Peace Officers Research Association of California (PORAC), Taxpayers for Improving Public Safety, and American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), as well as over fifty other prevention advocacy organizations throughout the state.

SB 1356 is Yee’s first bill signed by the Governor in 2008.  SB 1356 officially becomes law on January 1, 2009.