National Advocacy Committee Report

YWCA Pacific Region

Advocacy Committee

National Advocacy Committee Report

March 2, 2011

The YWCA USA convenes monthly conference calls of Advocacy chairs of the 9 regions & national Advocacy staff.

Randi Schmidt, Director of Advocacy, gave the following update.

1. Capitol Hill Day will be on April 7th. 117 from YWCAs all over the county have signed up so far – double that are anticipated. Prep work will include webinars on March 17th & 23rd and possibly 31st ; briefing on April 17 over breakfast; “Leave-behind” glossies will be provided then. Lobby visits will be scheduled by the national office for between 10:00 and 4:00. Room at the Capitol will be staffed by YW USA Advocacy staff all day. A “Meet and Greet” time will be from 2:30 to 3:30 pm for legislators to drop in. All YW attendees will turn in a summary of their visits to their legislators at the end of the day – for follow-up action. Issues: will focus on CBDG funding, VOCA and child care.

2. Call-in day: Materials will be distributed to all YWCAs so those unable to go to DC can participate by calling or emailing their local reps’ offices with “ I am sorry I cannot be with my YWCA sisters in DC today, but I support their efforts to ---“ message.

3. Immigration: will not be emphasized because very divisive, inside view is that will not be addressed in this session, & that anti-immigration people will jeopardize other programs, such as Violence Against Women funding being required to ID victims at shelters for citizenship. YWCA will invite champions of immigration to give advice on how to work on this issue & where can be most effective. YW is working on unified statement.

4. Day 2 (April 8) of YWCA USA annual meeting will be combined with Feminist Majority training with focus on violence against women, immigration, & reproductive rights. Dolores Huerta, co-founder with Cesar Chavez of the Farmworkers’ Union, will be a speaker. (April 9 will be a full day of workshops with the Feminist Majority.)

5. New staff: Terri Harper Cuthbertson, Director of Violence Against Women Policy; Rhonda Bishop, Advocacy Associate, is graduate of Howard University, has 1.5 years experience on the Hill; Mia Jackson, Development Consultant, will update all electronic communications; Mary Semela, Director of Development, will also focus on eliminating racism issues.

6. Budget cuts: Prediction is Senate & House will extend budget for 2 weeks with some compromises; 61B is too much to cut. VAWA draft is behind schedule: Senator Leahy wants White House & Dept. of Justice input; Republican Judiciary Comm. wants to get rid of duplicate programs; support for the bill depends on program’s effectiveness and no dollar increase.

Updates from the regions: most are working on budget crises at state level; one is doing training with follow-up support calls; one is using training $$ to send reps to DC; another is doing “Stand Against Racism” workshops and exploring “Men Against Violence” work, & recommended Scott Brown’s book for description of violence & effects; one has created “Advocacy Fitness” – a model for building capacity -- & has enlisted 3 new Associations. For Pacific Region this month, I reported on the Claremont workshop with action commitments, letter writing campaign on the CA budget with fact sheet & sample letter, & the regional meeting at Asilomar.

Report by Kay Philips March 6, 2011