The BDVP is expanding medical advocacy services in pediatric settings!
In a victory for victims of domestic violence and their advocates, the Philadelphia City Council voted last week to pass an ordinance allowing victims of domestic or sexual violence to take time off from work to address the situation without fear of losing their jobs. The ordinance, which provides up to eight weeks of unpaid leave, gives victims the chance to participate in the legal process, attend medical, counseling, or legal appointments, or seek emergency shelter while ensuring that they will be able to return to their jobs.
In fact, of the 3,000 victims of domestic violence who were served by Lutheran Settlement House’s Bilingual Domestic Violence Program in the past year, the vast majority were currently employed or had been employed when the violence occurred. For victims, the ordinance represents an important step in helping to mitigate the effects of the violence on their ability to remain employed. With the passage of this ordinance, victims will no longer be forced to choose between their job and their safety. Additionally, it may enable more victims to seek the help they need since economic security is consistently identified as one of the largest obstacles faced by women who want to leave their abusive partners. According to Brendan Boyle, Democratic Nominee for the State House of Representatives in District 170, “This new law would allow those who have been abused the opportunity to get the help they need without having to worry about losing their job and health benefits. Women who are fired because they are recovering from domestic violence are victimized twice. We simply cannot allow that to continue.”
Testifying in support of the ordinance before the City Council’s Committee on Law and Government, Ana Lisa Yoder, Director of LSH’s Bilingual Domestic Violence Program, pointed out to the Council that “victims of domestic violence who wish to pursue legal remedies in Philadelphia are asked to navigate an extremely complicated system, requiring an extraordinary amount of time that can very directly affect their ability to maintain employment.”
While the Greater Philadelphia Chamber of Commerce expressed concern about the potential financial and economic impact of the ordinance on businesses, advocates for domestic violence victims argued that domestic violence already affects businesses negatively. According to the Bureau of National Affairs, domestic violence costs U.S. businesses between $3 and $5 billion annually, and a large portion of these costs are incurred through the hiring and training of new workers when domestic violence forces victims to leave their jobs. Additionally, according to the Family Violence Prevention Fund, 24% of abused women said they were either late or missed days of work due to abuse, and 54% of abused women reportedly missed up to three full days of work per month.
Philadelphia now joins several other major cities, including New York, Washington D.C., San Francisco, and Miami, in providing this important protection for workers who are victims of domestic or sexual violence.
For more information about LSH’s Bilingual Domestic Violence Program or our advocacy efforts, please contact LSH at 215-426-8610
In response to the issues facing companies whose employees are victims of domestic violence, as well as the large number of victims who reported issues related to maintaining employment in the midst of domestic violence, in 2006 Lutheran Settlement House designed and began providing a specialized training to Philadelphia’s employers on addressing the effects of domestic violence on the workplace. Since that time, we have trained close to 500 supervisors, managers, and employees about the impact of domestic violence on the workplace and best practices for addressing this issue. Among others, we have trained all of the supervisors and managers of Philadelphia’s Community Behavioral Health System and Liberty Resources, as well as staff from the Department of Public Health, the Department of Human Services, and Philadelphia’s Coalition of Mental Health/Mental Retardation Centers. In our trainings it is common for multiple participants to disclose that they have either dealt with an employee struggling with domestic violence or have experienced domestic violence themselves.
The University of Pennsylvania’s Annenberg School for Communication found in a public opinion survey that 76% of Philadelphians believe employers should play a role in helping to stop domestic violence. Anecdotal evidence shows us that when employers support employees who are experiencing domestic violence this increases morale and loyalty in the workplace. It has also been shown that firing victims due to domestic violence situations prevents disclosure from other employees and co-workers, which increases the danger of violence spilling into the workplace. Our trainings are meant to help employers understand how to manage domestic violence cases before they explode, and to understand the importance of developing and implementing policies which provide support for employees who may be victims of domestic violence.
For more information about LSH’s domestic violence training for employers, please contact Ana Lisa Yoder, Director of the Bilingual Domestic Violence Program, at 215-426-8610, ext. 231
With the financial support of the Connelly Foundation, LSH’s Bilingual Domestic Violence Program (BDVP) has expanded our Medical Advocacy Project to the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP). In a collaborative project with the Institute for Safe Families and CHOP, the BDVP gives health care providers at CHOP’s four primary care centers direct access to a domestic violence counselor through a pager system. The counselor also provides domestic violence training, technical assistance, and case consultation support to the centers.
The BDVP has a long history of addressing domestic violence issues in medical settings. From 1996, when the first medical advocacy programs were developing across the state, to 2005, we led a successful collaborative project with the Medical College of Pennsylvania, providing quality counseling, advocacy, and training services at the Medical College of Pennsylvania Hospital.
When MCP closed in 2005, LSH began providing these services for the first time in a pediatric setting, at St. Christopher’s Hospital for Children through the Children and Moms Project (CAMP), a collaborative effort between Lutheran Settlement House, the Institute for Safe Families, and St. Christopher’s Hospital for Children. CAMP was formed in recognition of research showing that one of the most effective ways to prevent child abuse and neglect is intervention in domestic violence (American Academy of Pediatrics, 1998).
CAMP at St. Christopher’s represents the first pediatric hospital-based domestic violence intervention program in the state of Pennsylvania. In the three years since the project’s inception, the domestic violence counselor has received more than 300 referrals from health care providers throughout the hospital and provided training to close to 2000 clinical and non-clinical staff within the system. She has also spoken locally and nationally about the success of the project.
We are pleased to expand this successful project to CHOP and are grateful to the Connelly Foundation for their financial support.
The Bilingual Domestic Violence Program is increasingly getting national attention for our innovative efforts. BDVP Staff members presented a total of three workshops at the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence’s 13th National Conference on Domestic Violence: Building Grassroots Leadership for Social Justice held July 18 – 23, 2008 in Washington, DC. Workshop titles were:
• Dating Violence, LGBT Youth, and Homelessness: Making the Connection.
• Changing a Culture: Maintaining a Grassroots Perspective in a Medical Setting.
• Health Care Providers Responding to Domestic Violence: The Role of Research.
Responses to all of the workshops were overwhelmingly positive. Conference organizers received nearly 250 workshop proposals from across the country, so the BDVP was honored to highlight our work at the national level.
Safe use of technology has become a major issue among our youth. According to a survey conducted by Teenage Research Unlimited, a research organization specializing in research on teens and young adults, about one in three teens who have been in a relationship said their partner has text messaged them 10, 20 and up to 30 times per hour to find out where they are, what they're doing, or who they're with.
In order to recognize and address the problem of teen dating violence and technology abuse among our youth, Lutheran Settlement House’s Bilingual Domestic Violence Program is launching a new teen outreach and education effort with the support of Verizon.
Our educators are available to come to local schools or organization to do short presentations with middle to high school aged youth, during which students will be given information on teen dating violence and how to increase safety when using technology.
For more information on our Bilingual Community Education Programs, please call 215-426-8610 x 279.
Lutheran Settlement House (LSH) is proud to announce the call for nominations for its 5th Annual “Women of Courage: Women of Inspiration” Awards.
Lutheran Settlement House is a non-profit, non-sectarian social service organization that serves over 11,000 women, men, and children each year through four program areas: Adult Education and Employment, Domestic Violence, Senior Services, and Homeless Services.
The awards to be presented by Lutheran Settlement House along with Verizon Wireless, Beneficial Savings Bank, Health Partners, The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and Liberty Lutheran Services among others at the Women of Courage: Women of Inspiration ceremony, will recognize eleven Philadelphia-area women who have overcome obstacles and made outstanding contributions in one of LSH’s four fields of service.
Nominees must be women living or working in Philadelphia who have overcome difficult life circumstances to make outstanding achievements in their lives, and have found the spirit to give back to others and make a difference in our community.
For sponsorship opportunities or to obtain a nomination form, please call Suzette Belz, Director of Marketing and Philanthropy, at (215) 426-8610 x 208 or sbelz@lutheransettlement.org. Nomination forms may also be downloaded from Lutheran Settlement House’s website by clicking here...
