Policy & Law
Federal Legislation
WCASA works closely with the National Alliance to End Sexual Violence (NAESV) tracking Federal Legislation impacting our anti-violence work and Budget Appropriations for Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) programs including Sexual Assault Services Program (SASP) and the Victims of Crime Act (VOCA); as well as the CDC Rape Prevention Education (RPE) program.
Action Alerts
Take Action to Support VAWA Reauth
Thanks to all who called your Senator or otherwise raised your voice to aid the passage of the Violence Against Women Act Re-authorization in the Senate on April 26th. Now, the bill is on to the House, where it once again faces opposition in the form of a Cantor-Adams version of the bill. This version weakens or deletes entirely some of the vital improvements in the Senate bill, including the strong provisions that are designed to increase the safety of Native women and the needs of the LGBT community, and it contains damaging provisions that create obstacles for immigrant victims seeking to report crimes.
The Senate bill was the product of significant input from experts in the law enforcement and advocacy fields, and was only introduced after the many interested communities had had a chance to review it, and offer suggestions, and improvements, and raise concerns. The House has the opportunity to conduct a similarly deliberative process, and we hope that like the Senate, the result will be a strong bi-partisan bill that strengthens protections for all survivors of violence.
We must tell our legislators that we oppose the Cantor-Adams bill and want to see a bipartisan bill that includes ALL victims. The House of Representatives is in recess so it’s a good time to reach out to them.
UPDATE: May 16, 2012 - yesterday the White House released a statement opposing H.R. 4970 
Resources
U.S. Senate www.senate.gov
U.S. House of Representatives www.house.gov
U.S. DOJ Office on Violence Against Women (OVW) www.ovw.usdoj.gov
The Tribal Law & Order Resource Center has posted slides and audio of their webinar on the Tribal Law & Order Act [This content is hosted on SlideShare, a great, free presentation hosting site. It requires Adobe Flash to be running in your browser (also free)]
TOOLS FOR LEGISLATIVE ADVOCACY
Thomas - Library of Congress Legislation Search
Federal Sexual Assault Advocacy Guide
SAPolicyWatch – Sexual Assault Policy Watch, a list-serve managed by the National Alliance to End Sexual Violence (NAESV) and the National Resource Sharing Project (NRSP), run by Iowa Coalition Against Sexual Assault, is a resource for agencies or individuals interested in current SA policy. To subscribe, email: SAPolicyWatch-subscribe@yahoogroups.com [email link] (you must include a sentence regarding why you are interested in membership with your request to join).
NAESV Policy list-serve, to subscribe email: NAESVPolicy@yahoogroups.com
