Danger to Women and Children: States Cut DV Programs During Recession

September 3, 2009

Jan Erickson, Government Relations Director

Women's safety advocates were stunned to hear in late July that California Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger line-item vetoed $20 million from the state budget which would have funded 94 domestic violence (DV) shelters and centers. The cut would shrink their budgets by one-third and require programs to scale back or cancel services such as emergency shelters, transitional housing, legal advocacy and counseling. The California Partnership to End Domestic Violence reports that three DV centers already have been forced to close because of the loss of funding.

The $20 million was part of a $665 million reduction to the state's budget that included cuts to many other important social service programs. Loss of funding for anti-domestic violence and sexual assault services comes at a time when California is struggling with a massive budget deficit, but Schwarzenegger's choice of eliminating a program that will put at risk tens of thousands of vulnerable women and children is just plain irresponsible.

The Vagina Monologues author Eve Ensler, writing in The Huffington Post (Aug. 19) wonders how the Terminator "sleeps knowing that women across his state who are exposed to brutality will be left without escape, shelter or even a friendly voice at the end of a hotline." Ensler points out that in the past six months, five men in California have murdered their families and themselves. One hotline, in Contra Costa County, Calif., received triple the normal number of calls in just the first seven months of this year.

California Activists Should Contact Legislators ASAP

Schwarzenegger's line-item vetoes of funding for such programs as health care for low-income children, AIDS testing and prevention and many other vital social services were severely criticized by advocacy organizations and state legislative leaders. To address the DV program crisis, the U.S. Justice Department provided emergency grant funding of $3 million to six California programs. One state legislator, Sen. Leland Yee, has introduced a bill that would restore $16.3 million to domestic violence programs; he proposes to use money from the Crime Victim Restitution Fund reserve - which is funded by criminal payment of fines and penalties. But action on Yee's bill (SB 662) must happen by Sept.11 when the session ends. California activists are advised to call California State Assembly Speaker Karen Bass (916-319-2047) to urge that the SB 662 be bought to a floor vote as soon as possible.

Other States See DV/SA Program Funding Reduced

News reports suggest that the economy is contributing to the rise in family violence, but the recession is drying up funding for countless social services programs. Domestic violence program funding in many other states is in jeopardy. In Hawaii, nine DV shelters will have their contracts limited by the state and advocates fear that these shelters could lose all their funding by November.

Legal aid programs in Massachusetts are losing funding for staff and programs which means fewer resources for victims of domestic violence. The Connecticut Post notes a $120,000 cut for DV services in New Haven. A DV shelter in Kankakee, Ill. has shut down after 23 years of service. Legal aid funding in West Virginia has been cut by 62 percent, reducing services to help protect victims of violence.

In Illinois, the legislature reduced funds for domestic violence programs by 75 percent and scores of DV shelters, sexual assault and other social service programs have been forced to cut staff, reduce hours and trim other services. A number of programs have closed down in that state.

Advocates worry that many more domestic violence programs are at risk. They emphasize that these cuts could not have come at a worse time during a deep economic recession that has seen hundreds of thousands of workers lose their jobs and millions of homeowners face foreclosure.

Stress Does not Cause Violence, but Influences It

Economic hardships oftentimes lead to depression, anger and stress among family members, especially men. Money is tight and many people face unemployment and reduced income. Unfortunately, economic pressures to support a family will leave women in abusive relationships with no choice but to stay with their battering husbands. During hard economic times battering may escalate because the perpetrator may be spending more time at home. The important point to be made, however, is that the economy does not cause violence, but influences it.

Alarming Reports of Increased DV, Child Abuse

In April, the Florida Department of Children and Families' hotline reported that domestic violence shelters were over capacity and were turning victims away. A Department official told the Associated Press that the situation is the worst seen in years, with a 40 percent jump in demand for DV shelter services. Florida is one of the states with high numbers of housing foreclosures.

The San Diego County Domestic Violence Hotline reported a 20 percent increase in calls in January of this year over 2008. The San Joaquin County Women's Center has said that the number of clients seeking assistance in obtaining restraining orders increased 50 percent in the first three months of 2009. San Joaquin County had the highest number of foreclosures in the nation. DV shelters in Oklahoma City have been filled to capacity and are turning women away.

Across the nation, three-quarters of 600 domestic violence shelters have reported that more women sought help between Sept., 2008, and April 2009, according to the Mary Kay Ash Charitable Foundation in Dallas.

The National Domestic Violence Hotline (I-800-799-SAFE) reported that calls in the third quarter of 2008 were up significantly from the same period in the previous year, with Sept., 2008, up 21 percent. The hotline receives over 255,000 calls per year. A survey conducted of nearly 8,000 callers found that 54 percent reported a change in their household financial situation in the past year and 64 percent said that they believe the abusive behavior had increased over the period.

In addition, a national survey of law enforcement officials recorded that 88 percent believed that the economic crisis has led, or will lead to more child abuse and neglect. Just outside of Washington, D.C., the number of abuse and neglect cases rose 23 percent in Fairfax County, Va.; 29 percent in Montgomery County, Md.; and 18 percent in the District of Columbia during 2008.

According to the Associated Press, some hospitals report treating more than twice as many shaken babies as a year ago and that deaths from domestic violence have increased sharply in some areas. The St. Louis Children's Hospital reported in April that they are seeing more -- and more severely -- shaken and beaten children and that in March, 200 children had to be turned away for lack of bed space in their crisis nursery. The hospital says it is seeing record child abuse caseloads.

Even dating violence may be on the increase. A survey conducted by the Family Violence Prevention Fund earlier this year found that one in three teens reported experiencing sexual or physical abuse or threats of abuse in dating relationships. Forty-four percent of teens whose families have experience economic problems in the past year have witnessed verbal or physical abuse between their parents, and 67 percent of those tends have experienced abuse in their own relationships, according to a Women's eNews article. Schools may be reducing programs aimed at preventing dating violence as their budgets are reduced.

Tragic Murder-Suicide Cases Increasing

More tragic are the reports of murders and suicides. Milwaukee reported a 40 percent increase in homicides related to domestic violence in the first three months of 2009, according the city's police chief. Domestic violence-related homicides doubled in Maine during the past year.

Time Magazine reported in April that at least 43 people had been killed in murder-suicides in the previous six weeks. Violence Policy Center Legislative Director Kristen Rand says that murder-suicides used to be rare at one or two every three months, but that there is a huge increase, with a murder or suicide occurring at the rates of one every week or two.

In April, a New York couple and their two daughters were found dead in a suburban Baltimore hotel room. Police believe that the father, William Parente, a well-known attorney, killed his wife Betty and daughters, Catherine, 11, and Stephanie, 19, a student in Loyola College in Baltimore. Parente was reported to possibly have been depressed and having financial problems. That same week, in Middletown, Md. a man killed his wife and their three young children before fatally shooting himself. Thirty-four year old Christopher Allen Wood, a sales accountant at CSX Corp., faced financial problems and indicated in a note that he had psychiatric problems. Wood was said to be suffering from anxiety and depression and had been prescribed four anti-depressant medications.

In Ohio, a state with high unemployment, there have been three murder-suicides in the last three days. Carolyn Givens, of the Ohio Suicide Prevention Foundation, reported that since January a total of 25 homicide-suicides have been recorded. Givens says "poor economic conditions plus cuts to programs that help treat people with mental health problems and drug and alcohol addition make for a toxic combination."

Mental Illness, Intense Attachment in Murder-Suicides

Mental health experts Donna Cohen and Paul Quinnett of the Violence and Injury Prevention Program at the University of South Florida which has studied murder-suicides over the last 15 years call attention to the unsettling rash of murder-suicides recently. They found that of the 50,000 persons in the U.S. who die from homicide and suicide each year, 1,500 to 2,500 are murder-suicide deaths. The researchers wrote in the St. Petersburg Times (April 23) that perpetrators of murder-suicide have four core characteristics: psychiatric illness or disturbed thinking, an intense attachment to the victims, a need to control or exert responsibility to maintain control over a situation, and a belief that something is threatening the integrity of their attachment to the victim(s).

Cohen and Quinnett say that the "majority of suicidal people, including those who commit murder-suicide, have serious untreated psychiatric illnesses, and that these conditions can be detected, diagnosed and treated successfully in most cases." They note that the National Institute of Mental Health has estimated that more than 90 percent of those who die by suicide (homicidal or not) have disabling and untreated disorders and, if our country had an effective system of mental health care, it is estimated that at least 16,000 lives could be saved each year, not counting a significant number of homicide victims whose lives could be saved as well.

"Real Men" Culture Results in Violence

Finally, University of Northern Iowa Professor Katherine van Wormer who has studied murder-suicides, says that we need to look critically at gender. Writing for Women's eNews, van Wormer, "We must examine this culture that defines what it means to be a "real man" in our society and that produces men who react to personal crisis with such premeditated violence against the women and children in their lives." Professor van Wormer, with Albert R. Roberts, has written a book, "Death by Domestic Violence: Preventing the Murders and Murder-Suicides" (Praeger, 2009).

Whatever the reasons that some men become violent under stress, it is clear that this country must significantly increase resources for education, prevention, diagnosis, treatment, and shelters. Stress -- and especially stress due to economic factors -- is a fact of everyday life, but a violent response should not be tolerated. Mental health services at times of severe economic recession should be made widely available and a co-equal part of universal and affordable health insurance coverage.

Now more than ever is the need evident.