A Million Stories

All the news we care to print.

by Holly Otterbein and Andrew Thompson

Evan M. Lopez

The Year of Our Lord 2010 is shaping up to be an, um, OK year for domestic violence service providers. Of course, compared to the Year of Our Lord 2009 — when both Philly and the state saw the need for domestic violence services (and domestic homicides) go up while the funding for those services went down — what isn't an OK year?

But let's not be Cynical Cynthias. After all, the health-care reform bill bans insurance companies from denying battered women coverage on account of domestic violence being a "pre-existing condition," which eight states (not Pennsylvania) and the District of Columbia allowed them to do. 

Additionally, the federal Family Violence Prevention and Services Act (FVPSA) just might be reauthorized, if U.S. Rep (and U.S. Senate candidate) Joe Sestak (D-Delaware County) has anything to say about it. Enacted by Congress in 1984, the FVPSA provides partial funding for more than 2,000 domestic violence shelters around the country — but hasn't been re-authorized since 2008. This means that funding for the shelters is established on a year-to-year basis, leaving it more open to attack by politicians, especially during an economic downturn. Locally, one of FVPSA's beneficiaries is Women Against Abuse (WAA), the Philly domestic violence shelter we told you about last month [News, "4,671," Holly Otterbein, March 18, 2010], which had to turn away 4,671 victims in 2009 due to lack of funds.

Sestak is pushing U.S. Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.), chairman of the House Education and Labor Committee, for a vote on FVPSA, as well as a $75 million increase in domestic-violence services funding across the country.

"We've been working on this type of legislation for some time because domestic violence is a very serious problem here, specifically," says Jonathon Dworkin, a Sestak campaign spokesman. "In 2009, there were 179 domestic homicides in Pennsylvania, and only a few years before that there were 120, so things are clearly getting worse."

If Congress reauthorizes FVPSA, it's not immediately clear how much money will trickle down to WAA. But, at least, the shelter would find out soon after its passage, and could then plan for its next fiscal year accordingly — a simple thing that is all but impossible to do under the current system.

As of press time, no vote has been scheduled.

Note to Congress: Get on the ball, please.

Reports about Reports

After 20 years of studies, analyses, reanalyses, lawsuits, protests and counter-protests regarding the Delaware River deepening project, guess what the Government Accountability Office (GAO) just published?

Another report! Released April 2, this one is a follow-up to the GAO's 2002 report on the controversial project, a $300 million plan to deepen the river's navigation channel from 40 feet to 45 feet, thus attracting bigger ships and bigger business. In its first report, the GAO found that the Corps had overstated the project's annual economic benefits by $26.8 million, and asked the agency to conduct a reanalysis. In the GAO's 2010 reanalysis of the Corps' reanalysis (yeah, we know), things have ostensibly gotten better. The GAO writes that the Corps' new report (first released in 2004, then updated in 2009) "corrected miscalculations and important omissions we identified in 2002 that affected the project's benefit and cost estimates." One such correction: In 2002, the GAO found $4.7 million in unaccounted economic benefits that the Corps later blamed on a computer error.

Eight years later, there's no such thing! Progress!

As you inch your way down the 67-page report, however, the GAO's tenor becomes less fulsome. The office says that the Corps' claim that containerized cargo will bring in $6.1 million in economic benefits per year may not be "fully resolved." Specifically, the Corps makes this claim based on "more direct delivery of goods to Philadelphia" on two trade routes; the GAO says one such trade route may not yet exist. Oopsies.

The GAO also calls the Corps' suggested economic benefits related to crude oil — which account for 49 percent of the project's total benefits — "not consistent with current market and industry conditions." Of course, some of these market and industry conditions may iron themselves out when the recession passes. But the GAO says that others likely won't ever return to what they were in the early aughts. The Corps is moving forward, anyway. "There is nothing in the GAO's final report that even approaches a deal breaker," says Corps spokesperson Ed Voigt. "Note their report is entitled 'Comprehensive Reanalysis Corrected Errors, but Several Issues Still Need to Be Addressed' — this is a far cry from the 'Comprehensive Reanalysis Needed' of eight years ago."

In other words, close enough.

Annals of Bureaucracy

On March 30, a throng of LGBTQ folk led by the group SEPTARAGE (Riders Against Gender Exclusion) gathered outside Centre Square Plaza (the one with the clothespin) to protest SEPTA's alleged inaction on fixing gender designations on TransPasses that sometimes result in haranguing or the revocation of passes. Specifically, RAGE argued that SEPTA had not given them a streamlined avenue to file complaints or laid out a plan for fixing the problem. SEPTA says it has.

By: Evan M. Lopez (CLICK IMAGE FOR LARGER VERSION)

We're here to render judgment. If you've kept up with the world of SEPTA and/or LGBTQ, you know about the flashpoint between the two over gender designation on TransPasses: Female transsexuals use cards marked "M" (or vice versa), get harassed by overpaid SEPTA workers sitting in booths and sometimes have their passes revoked. Last October, a delegation of the concerned held a meeting with SEPTA brass to discuss how to more efficiently lodge complaints and figure out when the gender designation would be abolished. The verdict: Transsexuals would have access to the personal phone number and e-mail of Rochelle Culbreath, SEPTA's government affairs coordinator, if any problems arose, and the passes would be changed when a new pay system is instituted, which should be, oh, you know, eventually.

To date, however, Culbreath hasn't gotten a single call: "We could have talked to her, but we couldn't guarantee anyone that they would get their money back" if employees prevented them from using their passes, says Max Ray, RAGE's spokesperson. "There wasn't a big effort because it didn't seem like a real solution."

Culbreath was supposed to be a temporary contact; by January, however, SEPTA hadn't yet figured out who the permanent contact would be. "After months of waiting, RAGE realized that SEPTA was not committed to doing anything tangible for riders harmed by their discriminatory TransPass policy, and that RAGE would have to do the job of SEPTA. We chose not to advertise the temporary SEPTA system that had no accountability ... ," Ray e-mails.

Point conceded. Let's call this a tie. After all, it's one thing to demand that SEPTA take action. But expecting them do it competently? Let's keep our expectations realistic.

This week's report by Holly Otterbein and Andrew Thompson. E-mail us at amillionstories@citypaper.net.