Crisis funding plummets during pandemic (Cleveland.com) October 9, 2020
By: Sondra Miller, President and CEO of Cleveland Rape Crisis Center and Melissa Graves, Chief Executive Officer of Journey Center for Safety and Healing (formerly Domestic Violence & Child Advocacy Center)
It just doesn’t add up.
Across our region, survivors of domestic violence, sexual assault and human trafficking are reaching out for help more than ever before.
A global pandemic quarantined women and children with their abusers. The subsequent economic crisis and the record unemployment rate has made more people more vulnerable to predators looking to exploit their bodies for personal gain.
At Cleveland Rape Crisis Center, the number of hotline calls has more than doubled in recent years, and the Journey Center for Safety and Healing (formerly Domestic Violence & Child Advocacy Center) has seen a surge in need for support, advocacy and shelter.
Our community has worked hard over decades to bring violence, abuse and trafficking out of the shadows and into the spotlight. Our efforts to prevent violence are gaining traction. Now is the time to reinforce, not dismantle, these critical services.
So why, then, over the course of several months are we quietly defunding services to survivors and the agencies who support them?
This article was originally published on Cleveland.com on October 9, 2020.
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