Comments by Joey Honeycutt | Eastern North Carolina Now

While I've no doubt that this article is well-intentioned, it nonetheless denotes a gross misunderstanding of SB 664. And let me establish here and now that I am not among the "vested special interests" within North Carolina. What I am is a social worker with 7 years of experience working in rape crisis and domestic violence agencies throughout North Carolina. What this article fails to point out is that SB 664 establishes eligibility criteria that only 20% of NC counties are currently able to meet-- not due to corruption, but because those agencies are already working on a shoe-string budget to keep the doors open and ensure that survivors of sexual and domestic violence have access to the services they need. At the same time, the bill makes ZERO provisions to help the remaining 80 of our 100 counties meet the eligibility requirements. And we're not talking here about easy-to-meet requirements that involve changes to paperwork. We're talking about requirements that in order to receive state funds, a given county must have a DV shelter. Currently, only 49 of the 100 counties in this state have DV shelters-- again, not because there is not NEED, but because there is not FUNDING. This article makes it sound as if victim service agencies in NC are rolling in cash, when the reality is that most of us are one bad grant season away from having to lay off essential staff or even close our doors. SB 664 will only restrict that funding further and make it harder for us to do our jobs of serving survivors of rape and domestic violence-- because when it comes down to it, those survivors are the ones whose lives hang on this bill. SB 664 is bad policy. Period.

Commented: Tuesday, May 14th, 2013 @ 6:01 pm By: Joey Honeycutt