A Test of "W is for Women"

HUD Celebrates Domestic Violence Awareness Month

From Alas, A Blog, an alert from StopFamilyViolence.org.:

The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) is on the verge of implementing regulations that could place the lives of women escaping domestic violence at risk and the White House is the only office with the authority to hold them accountable.

In response to a Congressional mandate to obtain an unduplicated count of homeless people in America, HUD has asked service providers, including homeless and domestic violence shelters, food banks, housing authorities and law enforcement to input client information, including name, date of birth, social security number, and temporary residence, into the Homeless Management Information System (HMIS) – a computerized database to track people who are homeless. Furthermore, they encourage data sharing between service providers to help prevent duplication. Within any given state there could be literally thousands of people who have access to this information.

Many domestic violence shelters in this country rely on HUD funding and will be required to participate in the HMIS system. Early in the process of developing HMIS standards, domestic violence organizations raised concerns about client safety – explaining that there was a need for domestic violence victims’ identities and temporary residences to remain confidential so that their abusers can’t locate them.

In HUD’s preliminary standards for HMIS, released on July 22, 2003, these concerns were taken into account. However when final HMIS standards were released on July 30, 2004 the exemptions for domestic violence shelters and domestic violence victims had been removed!

If the exemptions for DV shelters aren't restored, domestic violence programs will be forced to choose between turning away critical funding for emergency shelters or violating victims' confidentiality and putting their lives at risk.

Please phone the White House by 5pm EST today - their comment line is 202-456-1111. Here's what you should tell them:

My name is (name). I'm calling from (city, state) to ask President Bush to stop HUD from putting women's lives in danger. The Administration must ensure that HUD restores protections for victims of domestic violence within the Homeless Management Information System. Citizens in my community are extremely alarmed by this breach of safety and confidentiality.

That's the most important step to take. For other steps, visit StopFamilyViolence's.org page on the HUD regulations. And if you're a blogger, please consider either linking to this post or (even better) reproducing it or something like it on your own blog.

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Most of my professional life was spent working with violent men -- sex offenders and batterers.  I know how critical this issue is.  Please help.