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Guest Commentary: July 6, 2001
Painting a Portrait to End Domestic Violence
The Honorable Jo Ann Emerson
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In 1997, Donald Hunt, an editorial writer, painted a startling portrait of domestic violence when he wrote, "If you take a couple of minutes to read this commentary, maybe while you enjoy a Sunday morning cup of coffee, you should know that while you're reading and sipping, thirteen women will be physically abused in America. Two of those women will be raped, one or both of them by a man she knows. Eight or more of those women will resist the attacks, verbally and/or physically."
As if those statistics weren't sobering enough, the one that most outraged me was learning that up until 1982, it was not illegal in the state of Missouri to beat your spouse! Thankfully, the law has been changed and several other laws at both the national and state level have been enacted in an effort to prevent and work toward an end to domestic violence. The Violence Against Women Act made substantial progress toward providing a range of services related to domestic violence. Those services included funding for hotlines, crisis intervention, support groups, court and advocacy programs, and shelters for victims of domestic violence.
Despite the new programs and increased awareness about the problem of domestic violence, some in rural America are still facing significant challenges. One of the biggest challenges stems in part from how states are defined as "rural" states. Currently, the formula used to determine funding for grants in rural areas is based on population of the state as a whole. In states like Missouri, larger population cities like St. Louis and Kansas City take the state as a whole out of the running for rural grant money that is desperately needed in rural areas of our state.
Those much-needed funds could be used to address some of the great disparities that exist in rural communities. For example, shelters only operate in 48 cities or towns across the state of Missouri. It doesn't take long to do the math before you realize that means that we do not even have one shelter per county. What's even more distressful is that because of the shortage of shelters, more than 4,900 people were turned away from shelters that were filled to capacity in 1999. [Source: Missouri Coalition Against Domestic Violence]
In the next few weeks, I will be teaming up with colleagues whose districts also have been affected by these cumbersome regulations to level the playing field and allow more rural communities throughout the nation access to critically needed funding. The legislation will allow us to redefine ‘rural' so states like Missouri, Mississippi and Alabama can apply directly at the federal level for grants that will enable them to serve their communities much in the same way that designated rural states, major metropolitan cities, and larger states help their victims right now. This is pro-family legislation and I am hopeful that my colleagues in already designated rural and urban centers will join us in moving this through Congress and to the President's desk.
It sometimes seems that you only hear statistics on domestic violence. But the victims of domestic violence have faces. They are the people we stand next to in the grocery store line. They are the child who is on the playground or in the classroom at our local elementary school. Simply put, domestic violence touches every facet of our community, and that is why we all must continue to work together to end the cycle of violence. We can do that and paint a portrait of promise for the future of our families.
Note: Rep. Emerson writes a weekly column; the above the the June 22, 2001 issue.
 How to contact Rep. Jo Ann Emerson (R-MO)
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