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OC battered womens shelter loses bid for emergency funds
October 7th, 2008, 6:06 pm · 24 Comments · posted by NORBERTO SANTANA JR.
County supervisors today denied $90,000 in emergency funding for the Womens Transitional Living Center, which houses more than 120 battered women and their children.
During a gut-wrenching debate - which caused Supervisor Pat Bates to emotionally recall her sister’s own death due to domestic violence - supervisors told the shelter’s staff that they would not supplement the $218,000 annual grant they currently give the shelter. Bates joined board Chairman John Moorlach and Supervisor Bill Campbell in voting the request down. Supervisors Chris Norby and Janet Nguyen voted in favor of the funding.
Norby wanted to use a park fund established by the board to help the shelter. He wondered out loud why he could use the money for a dog park, but not for the battered women.
Yet several supervisors publicly echoed the sentiment i’ve been hearing for several weeks over the shelter. They’re terrified of what’s coming next. Food shelters, homeless centers, orphans…who knows. This post-bailout economy is going to have a rough edge, and every county officials knows it.
“This is going to be an incredible time in our lives,” said Moorlach in announcing his vote against the center.
“We should get out of this business,” Moorlach said of the brutal task of trying to pick between one non-profit and another.
While others have criticized board members for failing to help the group - which is stumbling because the state has not sent it’s payments - Moorlach said there’s a limited pie of funding for such efforts.
He’s seeing that the county could even see layoffs if the economy continues faltering. His chief of staff Mario Mainero also echoed that point saying “we have a limited pie” and noted that maybe the employee unions want to forgo some raises and free up some money. There’s always the chance that their lawsuit against pension enhancements for deputies could win, he said, and that would free up money.
That last line triggered a strong response from Nick Berardino - who heads the Orange County Employees Association - and who also fundraised for the women’s shelter.
“Public employees, like all other working Americans are in severe financial difficulties. So before we take money from working men and women, we need to know how much money the board of supervisors have given to their friends and contributors in the way of contracts, like the Toursim Council.”
Those results would prove very interesting, Berardino said.
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DENA BUNIS, Washington bureau chief, 202-628-6381 or dbunis@ocregister.com
BRIAN JOSEPH, Sacramento correspondent, 916-449-6046 or bjoseph@ocregister.com
JENNIFER MUIR, County government reporter, 714-796-7813 or jmuir@ocregister.com
JOEL WALSH, Washington bureau intern, 202-628-6381 or jwalsh@ocregister.com
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$90,000 is nothing compared to the free food medical and lodging we give to the illegals. Take away the free lunch programs alone and you can fund this program for years.
Moorlach if I can vote against you I will. I was going to make a donation to the Food Bank and if I still can I will, but that donation will now go to OC Battered Women’s Shelter. My only wish is that were a person in that situation you could feel the pain and no place to go.
Dear Pat Bates:
Please tell me what your reasons are? At this point I do not understand. Did they mis-issue the funding? Sometimes we are talking about life and death. I am glad that your family member had a family to go to; but, what about those that don’t? Please find it in the budget and don’t hold these women hostage to the State and Federal Gov’t.
High five, jz16! John Moorlach and Bill Campbell will certainly not get my votes in the future! For shame (gentle-)men ~ for shame!
Stop spending money on illegals and their babies so we could spend money on Americans who need help.
“’We should get out of this business,’ Moorlach said.”
If we could get rid of you right now, Moorlach, we would. How disgusting that you couldn’t see your way to help a battered womens’ shelter.
And Mainero is disgusting, too, blaming the county’s shortfall on the unions. How about looking at Chriss Street and getting rid of him?? You might find a few extra dollars that way.
I know it was a tough decision to turn down the emergency funding request, but I think it was the responsible thing to do because there are hundreds of other non-profits in OC that are feeling the pinch from the state and I don’t think it is fair to award an emergency grant unless other non-profits have the same opportunity.
If additional funding is available, then, I think the responsible thing to do is for the Supervisors to release an RFP that establishes criteria for the grants and a fair allocation process to avoid favoritism to certain non-profits.
Thank you.
Shame on you Board of Supervisors. Do you only help those who provide campaign contributions ? No help for these abused ladies ? We have lived with your lack of leadership for sometime, I suppose we need to accept your lack of compassion and morality as well. Go Johnny Go, as far away from Orange County as you can. Please.
As a local teacher, I personally know several children living in this shelter. Every year, they come into my classroom dazed and frightened. I can only imagine the terror these children have witnessed. A dog park??? Seriously, how long will we tolerate people treating their animals like children while we allow others to treat women and children like animals. Give me a break!
Didn’t the shelter know they need to be members of the Lincoln Club to get help?
I suppose the rationale behind their decision makes sense to them, but we’re talking about some of the most vulnerable and downtrodden in our communities.
I know govenrment serves many purposes but aren’t its most fundamental duties to provide infrastructure and protections for its citizens? Don’t they have a duty to protect these people?
It’s simple the Shelter could not afford to hire expensive lobbyists who are capable of raising large sums of money for the Supes. Does anybody believe that things in OC work differently thanWashington ??????
I am amazed by Mainero’s comments. He uses the Board’s inability to help battered women as an opportunity to go after public employees? Really? Wow. I attended the fundraiser last week at OCEA and watched these same public employees dig into their pockets to contribute money to the shelter. The only “public employees” not represented at the event were members of the Board of Supervisors. Yesterday, while the Board was debating and rejecting the agenda item to provide relief for the Womens Transistional Living Center, public employees were again raising money for the cause. The WTLC had a popular booth at the annual health fair hosted at OCEA. To the Board members and their staff, actions speak louder than words. You spoke as if you cared and did nothing, the same public employees that you vilify and blame as the cause of all that is wrong with the world said nothing but acted.
Moorlach is blaming the unions on abused Women and Children?! So much for the “pro-life” argument…
So Pat Bates sister lost her life to domestic violence. She cries and then votes for the dog park. What part of this do y’all find disgusting?
Rather than reject the plea of WTLC because others might come before the Board for assistance, perhaps the Board should have focused more on the continuing plight of “the least of us” within OC. There are many ways in which the County spends money, but people need to be a very high priority–especially those who are most affected by the financial downturn. A more appropriate response, IMHO, would have been to fund WTLC (instead of a dog park, for crying out loud!) and then initiated an effort to develop criteria and funding priorities for the kinds of people-directed activities the County should and would be willing to help.
Instead, the Board seemed to say, “We won’t help anyone because we don’t know how to prioritize requests.” Give me a break, ladies and gentlemen: We expect you to be more mature, wise, and caring than this.
When can we vote to get Moorlarch out? I knew he was scum before I started reading these articles, but I didn’t know it was the bottom of the barrel!
Why doesn’t Moorlach use the 1 mil he’s spending on law firms to re-track the already approved retro pension for sheriff deputy’s. This guy is a peice of work (crap) and he continues to use his personel agendas for his own good. Other board members need to step up to the plate and squash this Moron-Moorlach.
This is just horrible. Our worthless Gov. Arnie gets on his knees and begs for a bailout for California and in that multi-billion dollars there isn’t $90,000 to keep this place open? By the way, how much free medical aid was given to people in this state that are illegal aliens in just this last week? The very same people that do not pay taxes. I guess the people standing in the way of this funding may not know what it is like to have a family member beat down by a drunk, worthless husband. I hope that it does not come down to them knowing before they decide to push this through. The ones standing in the way of this funding have never even stepped foot in this shelter. They can’t see the eyes of the women and kids there. To them, these are not people. To them they are just votes and numbers. That is it.
The board might have considered an alternative. Since there is already a fund — “supervisors told the shelter’s staff that they would not supplement the $218,000 annual grant they currently give the shelter,” — and since they are underfunded because the state is behind, maybe the board could have given them an advance to bridge the gap between their current needs and the state funding. Just like the state asking Washington for a loan to meet their current commitments the shelter needs money to meet theirs. This would be financially neutral. Money now, when it is really needed, or spread out monthly over the next year. The problem for the shelter is, if they don’t get the funding now, they won’t be here.
On behalf of the women and children WTLC serves, we thank you for the outpour of support and solidarity. We are extremely disappointed that the OC Board of Supervisors were not able to see our crisis as a humane issue rather than a political one. We are grateful for the two brave Supervisors Janet Nguyen & Chris Norby who stood up for all the victims whose voice we brought with us to the Board of Supervisors meeting.
We remain optimistic and hope that the community will continue to support these amazing women and children who’s journey will help transform them from victims to survivors. If you would like to help please visit WTLC at http://www.wtlc.org and consider making a tax deductible donation.
We thank you and sincerely hope you will keep us in your hearts and prayers as we desperately try to survive this horrible crisis.
When did it become okay to give money to dog park instead of hurting women and children. I am 17 and may not understand all these government rules and regulations but I do know this much - denying money to battered women and children and instead giving the money to fund a dog park is simple inhumane.
I am simply appalled at the decisions that the government is making, and I fear that my up and coming geration will not know how to clean up the mess caused by the ramifications of stupid decisions.
Why I am so passionate about this? Because I have built relationships with children occupying WTLC.I know the faces of these children. I have mentored a young girl and attempted to restore the hope that was lost in her life, all to find out that a dog park is more important. What is wrong with this picture? Where is the government that has promised to put it’s people first?
I will not let this stop me. I will continue to invest my life in these children and pour hope into them even if the government chooses to sweep them under the rug.
What are they supposed to tell the women and children “Um sorry but we figured that a dog park was more important that you”. What message are you sending Mr Moorlach?
I am 51 years old and have become closely acquainted with the “passing the buck” style of government, but have never seen it used so deftly as by Supervisors Moorlach, Campbell and Bates. Their stance was that since the budget issues lie primarily with the State, it is the State’s responsibility - not the County’s. The County appeals to the State and to the Federal government for additional money all the time. Obviously their policy is “do as I say, not as I do.” Too bad for the women and children who may die as a result of this policy.
I understand that we are in a financial crises, but seriously! This vote was a matter of life and death. It should have been a no-brainer. Oh and BTW, domestic violence is not immune to race, color, gender, status or money. We are all human and deserve respect and dignity. It was sad to see that Bates, Campbell and Moorlach don’t feel that way about all of their constituents. Maybe they should head back to church…