Domestic Violence and Poverty
Organizing an Advocacy Voice

by Janet Carter and Jill Davies

Impoverished women experience high rates of violence by male partners. Notably, women receiving public assistance face significantly higher rates of violence than other low-income women from the same neighborhoods.* Sweeping policy changes in almost every public support system during the past few years, including TANF, child support enforcement, public housing, and the criminal justice and child welfare systems, have only exacerbated the complexity and difficulty of the lives of economically poor battered women and their children.

In light of these concerns, the National Resource Center on Domestic Violence’s “Building Comprehensive Solutions to Domestic Violence” Project, and the Family Violence Prevention Fund’s (FVPF) Economic Independence Initiative, have crafted innovative strategies to help impoverished battered women and their children become an organized constituency for policy change and community action strategies that help them find safety and economic independence. This article reviews what has been learned from these efforts, and highlights two key strategies. These are:

1. organizing in local communities to create a constituency of poor women who can become powerful voices in advocating for meaningful policy and neighborhood-based changes; and 2. developing collaborations among government agencies, domestic violence service programs, anti-poverty advocates, substance  abuse  programs,  mental health  service  providers  and  a  constituency of impoverished battered women to craft comprehensive policy and practice.

Community Organizing and Constituency Building

Despite the well-intentioned work of domestic violence service organizations, anti-poverty groups and government agencies, impoverished battered women will not find true safety and economic security until they become a powerful voice in identifying and implementing neighborhood-based solutions to domestic violence that take into consideration the complex reality of their lives. The FVPF’s Economic Independence Initiative has initiated several projects to support, organize and empower women in their local communities. In Germantown, Philadelphia, the FVPF is supporting the efforts of low-income women to organize activities within their neighborhood that address the impact of overlapping domestic violence and poverty. Led by a partnership between the FVPF and three community-based agencies, the project works with residents of public housing – the Queen Lane community – to help them conduct neighborhood-based domestic violence prevention/intervention activities they have identified to meet the community’s needs. 

Queen Lane residents are intimately involved in all aspects of the initiative –  surveying their neighbors about their views on domestic violence, using these surveys to determine what neighborhood-based prevention/intervention activities to implement and providing leadership to conduct the neighborhood-based activities. Germantown Settlement, a multi-service agency, works in partnership with Women Against Abuse, a domestic violence program, and WISDOM, an organization working with Germantown women at high risk for HIV/AIDS, to implement this neighborhood-based community organizing model.

The FVPF also assists low-income rural immigrant battered women in organizing to educate their communities and make local government agencies and services more responsive to their needs. In 1999, the FVPF sponsored leadership training programs for these women in Iowa and Texas. Drawing on the qualities and skills they have already used to survive domestic violence, these women developed a plan for community action, and then met with local public officials, such as the police chief, health care administrators, domestic violence program staff and other social service providers to present their requests for changes in public policy and practice. In the next phase of their leadership training they will learn economic independence skills that take into consideration how domestic violence has impacted their lives.

Barriers to Economic Security for Battered Women and Failures of Existing Policy Initiatives

Despite the fact that impoverished battered women and their families make up a large proportion of public service agencies’ caseloads, many recent policy changes do not address the multiple barriers to employment that are likely to derail abused women’s successful transition to the job market. Some women are unable to work or to meet the new time-limited, work-focused TANF program requirements because their abusive partners/ex-partners sabotage their efforts. These women face daunting questions when deciding whether to leave violent relationships, such as, “Where can I afford to go with my children without him finding me?” and “How will I provide for myself and the children if I leave?” Some battered women may experience temporary or long-term health issues, including substance abuse or mental illness that may be caused by a history of domestic violence or child sexual abuse, making it difficult for them to work without additional assistance.

Policies specifically designed to address the interaction between domestic violence and poverty have missed large numbers of impoverished battered women. The “Family Violence Option” (FVO) allowed by the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 (PRWORA), for example, enables states to waive time limits and reduce work requirements for battered women so they can obtain assistance in overcoming barriers to their employment. So far, the FVO Program has only identified and served a small number of the battered women in the TANF Program. Few battered women are offered a tailored set of services designed to address their specific barriers to safety and employment. Additionally, many battered women do not disclose domestic violence for a variety of reasons, including distrust of the welfare system and fear that disclosure will result in a reduction of benefits, or worse, removal of their children by the child protection system.

Broad Collaborations to Develop Comprehensive Policy Agenda

While government agencies and nonprofit service organizations assist a significant number of impoverished battered women, the services are typically fragmented and provide only isolated pieces of the complex safety and economic security puzzle. Too often policies and services are developed without the input of economically poor battered women. Government agencies, domestic violence programs, anti-poverty advocates and substance abuse and mental health service providers must collaborate with each other in ways that make the voices of impoverished battered women central to the development of policies and community-based strategies. Only then will new approaches adequately address the complex barriers faced by these women and their families.

The importance of collaboration is illustrated in the work of Building Comprehensive Solutions to Domestic Violence, a multi-year initiative funded by the Ford Foundation and sponsored by the National Resource Center on Domestic Violence. Through the New England Network on Domestic Violence and Poverty, the project brings together battered women, domestic violence advocates, anti-poverty advocates, government agency staff and others to develop a comprehensive policy agenda that addresses domestic violence and poverty. The needs and perspectives of battered women are central to the success of this project. Through policy analysis and the experience of impoverished battered women, the initiative has identified many issues requiring collaborative solutions. For example, the child protection system might require a battered mother to spend more time with her child while the TANF system requires her to spend more time on work activities before “her time runs out.”

How should these competing policy directions be resolved? Regional efforts are under way to collaboratively develop best practices that address this and other issues. Network staff have begun to meet with poor women, men, and community advocates to identify ways that ensure poor and under-served community members will have access to resources available under the Workforce Investment Act (WIA) and how substance abuse and domestic violence issues might be raised and addressed by case managers implementing WIA programs.

Project staff also work in four Iowa communities to increase housing opportunities for battered women. This effort focuses on bringing together low-income housing providers, domestic violence program advocates, legal services attorneys, staff from the Department of Human Services and a community action agency to recommend changes in local public policy that will increase housing options for impoverished battered women.

In addition, Building Comprehensive Solutions to Domestic Violence works with domestic violence programs in Iowa to implement an economic literacy group curriculum called Personal Economic Planning (PEP), developed by the Elizabeth Stone House in Boston. Domestic violence program staff receive training on the PEP curriculum and use the material to help battered women develop economic independence skills. Each site also is developing a plan to increase economic opportunities for battered women through local economic advocacy in collaboration with other community partners.

The Family Violence Prevention Fund’s Economic Independence Initiative is addressing the complex overlap among domestic violence, substance abuse and mental health issues experienced by public assistance recipients having the most difficult time meeting the new TANF requirements. With funding from the Packard Foundation and other sources, the California Institute of Mental Health is working in collaboration with the Family Violence Prevention Fund, and Children and Family Futures, to develop model guidelines for welfare departments and service providers that help recipients get the assistance they need to overcome these barriers to employment. Recommendations include practices that would identify recipients in need of services through entry points other than the welfare office, permit the use of TANF funding for domestic violence services (in addition to funding already provided for substance abuse and mental health services), and implement identification and assessment procedures that are sensitive to the needs of recipients with multiple problems. 

Innovative projects such as those described above only begin to address the complex needs of impoverished battered women in a few pioneering communities. More work is needed to test other ways of broadening the constituency of low-income women who are demanding a change in the way the community and institutions respond to domestic violence in their lives. These women know first-hand about the competing and contradictory demands generated by current policies and practices. With effective collaboration, informed public policy, and adequate funding, we can help them create change in their communities, one neighborhood block at a time.

Janet Carter is Managing Director of the Family Violence Prevention Fund and Jill Davies, Deputy Director of the Greater Hartford Legal Assistance, Inc., is with the New England Network on Domestic Violence and Poverty
 

* Welfare, Poverty and Domestic Violence: New Research and Its Implications. Building Comprehensive Solutions to Domestic Violence Initiative, Lyon, E. forthcoming.  Harrisburg, PA: National Resource Center on Domestic Violence: Rates of violence in a 12 month period ranged from 9% to over 23%

Resources

• Family Violence Prevention Fund (415) 252-8900. Visit www.fvpf.org
• New England Network on Domestic Violence and Poverty (860) 541-5016
• For a list/copies of Building Comprehensive Solutions to Domestic Violence Papers on Poverty and Domestic Violence Issues contact the National Resource Center on Domestic Violence at (800) 537-2238 x 1

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