SETTING THE RECORD STRAIGHT (publ. 10/23/2009)
An article about state efforts to restore funding for domestic violence programs provided incorrect information about Community Solutions, a southern Santa Clara County nonprofit serving victims of domestic violence. The location of the agency’s shelter is confidential. The agency’s administrative offices are in Morgan Hill.
SACRAMENTO — Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger on Wednesday signed an emergency bill that restores more than $16 million for domestic violence programs in California — reversing one of his most controversial line-item budget cuts this summer.
The money will allow 94 shelters for women and their children to remain open through June. Since late July, when the governor slashed nearly $500 million from social service programs, six shelters have closed, and several others have cut back on staffing and counseling services. The money will allow the closed shelters to reopen.
“This is great news for every Californian whose life has been devastated by violence in their homes,” Schwarzenegger said.
But even as the governor and legislators hailed the restoration, some shelter operators were questioning how long those good feelings would linger. To find the extra funding, state officials had to borrow from a special gas tax fund — a one-time funding gimmick.
And the chronic deficits that prompted the cuts — lawmakers had already agreed to slash domestic violence programs by $4 million before the governor’s line-item veto — don’t appear to be easing. Even before a recent report showed anticipated state revenues lagging by more than $1 billion, the Legislature was left facing a $7.4 billion deficit next year.
“It’s not a permanent solution,” said Ken Goldstein, interim executive director of Sunnyvale-based Support Network for Battered Women. “We’re grateful for it this year. But it’s still tough times ahead.”
Goldstein said he’s cut into follow-up programs for victims and educational efforts meant to forestall domestic violence in the first place. He also had to put off hiring another worker to help keep the shelter running 24 hours.
He’ll now be taking applications, he said, “but it could be, a year from now, that we have to let that person go.”
The recent case of a Palo Alto woman who is alleged to have been killed by her abusive boyfriend — then burned in their cottage — shows how vital both shelters and prevention programs are, Goldstein said.
“That’s the cost of not having good prevention programs,” he said.
In restoring money for shelters, state leaders have once again retreated from some of the budget’s most draconian cuts.
Since the summer, officials have found money to keep open dozens of state parks and restore health insurance for nearly 700,000 needy children.
The domestic violence funding bill, SBXXX13 by Sen. Elaine Alquist, D-Santa Clara, passed the Senate unanimously last week.
It had been held up in a Republican blockade last month on the last day of the legislative session.
Perla Flores, director of Community Solutions, which operates a shelter in Morgan Hill and has offices throughout southern Santa Clara County, was among those left to wait while that political rift worked itself out.
Although she was relieved the money had been restored, she couldn’t help but note the $4 million in cuts that Schwarzenegger and the Legislature did not restore — and the money they’d cut in previous years.
“When you run a shelter,” she said, “you can’t say, ‘We’re not going to take calls one day a week or we’re not going to provide food or put on the air conditioning.’ “
Because of the bad economy, she said, women and children are staying in shelters longer while they hunt for homes of their own.
Without room to expand, Flores said she’s had to turn away 75 percent more clients since this summer.
“When a women doesn’t have a place to go, the option is returning to an abusive partner or becoming homeless — and many times they end up dead,” she said.
“Having a shelter could be the difference between life and death.”
Contact Denis C. Theriault at 916-441-4651.
