Madeline Garcia-Bigelow warns against narrowing funding and cites DOVE flexibility
Garcia-Bigelow says diverse survivor needs should not be forced into one bucket or infighting over rigid deliverables. She praises DOVE and COVID-era flexible funding and criticizes OCS for not separating domestic violence as it did mental health.
Literally just a couple of seconds.
I think it's been about 15 people that have spoken.
And when I was thinking through, what is it that we're missing?
I think we'll be missing a lot more if OCS continues the way that it's been discussed about today through the commissioner.
Because these are all needs that are all diverse and making it all one thing or another or just really focusing on, but we've given $15.7 million.
The biggest amount since 2018.
That's terrific.
Liz Roberts saying the pie needs to be expanded.
Yes, all of it is important.
So that survivors can elect to move forward and have the privilege to decide who's going to help us, how do we want to be helped, and if you're not helping me, I can elect to go somewhere else.
But the more we narrow things and make it where we're actually almost infighting for a bucket of money that the way
it is defined is through deliverables that don't really have anything to do with the work that's being done or a comprehension of the complexity of it.
I will say that one of the two, in my experience, two buckets of funding that have been exceptionally helpful have been DOVE
because it does allow you to pivot in ways that other grants simply don't allow.
Like you have to beg.
to can I please, I use this money instead of MetroCards for this, and the flexible funding that came as a result of COVID that has been continued statewide.
And I think that
That's what we need.
We need a belief in what survivors are saying is their need, and that need isn't stagnant.
Privilege is, in many respects, the ability to choose what you want and not lose your foothold.
And I think that this administration, although I hope that they step up,
They've made it real clear for eight months.
That it's all right, we got this.
I mean, we got it.
It's under Office of Community Safety.
They even recognize that mental health should be a separate division within Office of Community Safety, but not DV.
With these stories, not DV.
I said a few seconds.
I sometimes am not truthful.
Sorry.