Domestic Violence Money Remains

The budget for domestic violence prevention and victim aid will suffer no cuts, despite the recent thinning of the state budget, a decision that prompted loud applause from attendees at yesterday’s meeting of the Commission on Domestic Violence.

Acting Gov. Jane Swift presided over the meeting and heard reports regarding the enforcement of anti-violence laws, ongoing preventative training and financial matters.

“It will come as no shock to you that we are facing fiscal restraints,” Swift said, referring to recent cuts to state programs.

While other programs have suffered cuts, Carin Kale, undersecretary of the Executive Office of Health and Human Services, announced, “The government has kept each and every domestic violence item completely funded.”

In addition to the budget news, the commission heard comments from Jean Haertl, executive director of the Governor’s Commission on Domestic Violence, who discussed the current push to educate state employees in detecting domestic violence in the workplace.

Haertl said domestic violence is the leading cause of injury for working women, resulting in increased employee absence.

“We have a new zero-tolerance policy,” Haertl said. The state allows a 15-day paid leave for victims to receive help.

Over 4000 state employees have received training, Haertl said.

“An average of four out of every 25 [attendees] disclosed [their own] abuse during the training,” Haertl said.

Finally, the governor praised the staffers of the Safelink hotline, which recently celebrated its one-year anniversary. The hotline, run by victim services provider Casa Myrna Vasquez, is a statewide domestic violence hotline that provides callers with information regarding social services, emergency shelters and other resources.

Before Safelink was founded, “we weren’t all connected,” said Debra Robbin, spokeswoman for Casa Myrna Vasquez. “You had to call each individual program.”

She added Safelink workers now have the capability to connect callers with all resources.

In one year of operation, Safelink has received 26,904 calls, with an average of 100 calls per day. Thirty-one percent of calls came from the Boston area, Robbin said.