Sign on to a letter to Congress to save youth violence prevention funding

Sign on to a letter to Congress to save youth violence prevention funding

There is growing momentum in response to the potential elimination of CDC’s youth violence prevention activities in the federal budget proposals. We have received over 600 signatures on our letter asking congress to protect this critical funding. There is more than funding at stake; this is about saving lives.

We have a very small window in which to affect this process, and we need every voice to make a difference. We'd like to reach at least 750 signatures in the next week. Help us send a clear message to lawmakers: We cannot eliminate youth violence prevention at CDC. Please sign-on to a letter to Congress that asks members to protect federal youth violence prevention funding at CDC. You will be joining national partners such as National Association of City and County Health Officials (NACCHO) and the Safe States Alliance and local efforts such as the Violence Prevention Coalition of Greater Los Angeles when you sign on.

We have learned over the past 30 years how to help maintain community safety, reduce deaths and injuries and strengthen the environment needed for communities to thrive. Wiping out this funding threatens the entire public health approach to preventing violence and everything we have learned over the past decades. We cannot leave our children’s safety solely in the hands of the criminal justice system.

A public health approach to violence saves lives and supports thriving communities.  Reducing violence is a powerful way to stimulate economic development in communities. The public health approach brings a method and approach to the table that is grounded in the science that has confirmed that violence is preventable. We must not  wait until after-the-fact for more expensive responses and needless suffering. The federal funding level for youth violence prevention activities is a small but vital investment in the safety and future of our young people and our communities.

Among the efforts at stake is Prevention Institute’s UNITY (Urban Networks Increasing Thriving Youth) Initiative. UNITY works with cities all over the country to enhance their efforts to prevent violence. UNITY has also informed efforts to address violence as a contributor to chronic illness, the major contributor to skyrocketing healthcare costs. (See: the UNITY Fact Sheet: Links Between Violence and Chronic Diseases.)

Thank you for your continued action and for forwarding this email to your networks. 

For additional information, including fact sheets, visit Prevention Institute’s new Preventing Violence Advocacy page.

HB 605 needs support

HB 605 is a bill currently being considered by the General Assembly that requires the Illinois State Board of Education ( ISBE) to prepare a new report card for every district and school by October 31, 2013 and update the cards yearly thereafter.

The new cards would include detailed demographic data on students in addition to the gender, race and subgroup information now required. Mobility rates, curriculum data (percentage of students in advance placement courses, for example, or career/technical education instruction), percentage of students graduating "career ready" and a host of other data bits not currently reported will be required.

The revised report card was proposed and developed by the Illinois P-20 Council which sought to create a more informative and understandable school district report card.  

In fact, the Council has tested its proposal toward that end. Its project included subjecting the card to "stakeholders" in focus groups statewide. A survey of participants suggested 90% find the reports "easy to understand" and expect to use the cards.

United Way of Metropolitan Chicago endorses this bill and believes it will have a positive impact on our educational system. We urge you to join us by contacting your local legislator and advocating for its passage.  

Mark you calendars: Testify at an ISBE Budget Hearing

If you are unable to view the message below, click here to view this message on our website.

Every year, the Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) gives the public a chance to give input on the current years' budget and ideas for next year.  Every year, Illinois Action for Children encourages our members to attend these hearings and provide either written or oral testimony to the Board. It is just as important to make your voice heard this year as any other.  In the current FY12 budget, the Early Childhood Block Grant, the funding source for Preschool for All and Prevention Initiatives, was cut by 5%, or $17 million.  As a result, nearly 10,000 children around the state have found that there is no preschool program for them to attend this year.  More than 100 providers around the state, both schools districts and community-based organizations lost these funds, along with the services and jobs the funding sustained.  These losses come on top of a previous 10% cut in FY10 and three years of payments delays to providers.  Over the past three fiscal years, early childhood funding has been cut by $55 million and nearly 16,000 children have lost their preschool program. There are three more chances to have your voices heard. October 27, 2011 3 p.m. - 5 p.m. Ford Counties Regional Office of Education Robeson Pavilion Room A & B Champaign Public Library 200 W. Green Street Champaign November 1, 2011 3 p.m. - 5 p.m. Wheeling School Dist. 21 Administrative Office 999 W. Dundee Rd. Wheeling November 29, 2010 3 p.m. - 6 p.m. James R. Thompson Center Rm. 16-503 100 W. Randolph Chicago The Board needs to hear how important Preschool for All and Prevention Inititatives are to you and the children and families in your area and accross the state.  Illinois Action for Children can help you prepare written and/or oral testimony. For assistance, please contact Samir Tanna at 773/697-6134.

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Survey on Cuts to Emergency and Transitional Housing Program/Veto Session Efforts

I urge every state-funded organization (or if you received federal HPRP funding as well) to please complete this survey as soon as possible.  Any agency that receives state funding should have received the survey at the link below from Bob Palmer from Housing Action Illinois.  This is a very important collaborative effort.  This information is crucial to our advocacy efforts to maintain or restore funding for homeless programs.

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/J6839N8

I know that everyone is very busy, but I assure you that this will be time well spent!

Thank you,

Daria Mueller, MSW

Associate Director of State Affairs

Chicago Coalition for the Homeless

Email: daria@chicagohomeless.org

www.chicagohomeless.org

NEW CONTACT INFO as of 6/27/11:

70 E. Lake St., Suite 700

Chicago, IL 60601

312-641-4140, ext. 241

312-641-4144 fax

-----Original Message-----

From: Bob Palmer [mailto:bob@housingactionil.org]

This is a friendly reminder to please fill out our survey asking homeless service providers about the impact of government funding changes on different programs offered by your agencies. The sponsors are the Chicago Alliance to End Homelessness (and their Interim Housing Constituency Group), Chicago Coalition for the Homeless and Housing Action Illinois.

Here is a link to the survey:

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/J6839N8

We will use the results of the survey in our advocacy and public education efforts. The information you provide is very important in helping to give as detailed a picture as possible to lawmakers and funders about the impact of the cuts on our communities. However, all individual responses are confidential.

 The survey starts by asking for some general information about your agency's funding and then moves on to ask about some specific programs.

Multiple staff from a single agency may respond, but you may want to coordinate the responses of several staff through a single person.

If you can't, or don't want to, answer one or more questions, please just skip ahead to the next page of the survey.

If you have questions regarding this survey, please contact Bob Palmer at

312-939-6074 x. 206 or bob@housingactionil.org.

Thank you in advance for taking the time to complete this survey!

Bob Palmer

Policy Director

Housing Action Illinois

11 E. Adams #1601

Chicago, IL 60603

312-939-6074 x. 206 (phone)

312-939-6822 (fax)

312-282-3959 (cell)

bob@housingactionil.org

www.housingactionil.org

Housing Action Illinois' 2011 Annual Conference & 25th Anniversary Celebration is November 10-11 in Chicago. Information and registration at http://www.housingactionil.org/conference.

Help Prevent Violence Prevention funding loss

October 17, 2011

Last Chance to Sign On: Congressional Letter to Ensure Youth Violence Prevention Funding In just two days (Wednesday, 10/19) we will send an important letter to Congress, urging them to ensure that the funding for youth violence prevention activities at CDC is preserved. If you haven’t already, sign on here to voice your support. Preventing violence fosters thriving communities and equity. This small but vital funding stream is an important investment in other ways, too: preventing violence is a powerful way to stimulate economic development in communities. Almost three hundred of you have already signed on in a short time. We would like to add another two hundred and fifty more names before sending Wednesday. We need your help to make this happen! Sign on now. In addition to the sign on letter, you have written close to 3000 letters to Congress via the Preventing Violence - Advocacy page on our website, plus the many efforts organizations have undertaken on their own. And we're hearing from Congress that they're paying attention to our letters and calls. We know that the more voices they hear from, the better case they’ll be able to make to save youth violence prevention activities at CDC so be sure to sign the letter--and if you haven’t sent an email to your representatives, take two minutes and do it now. Email your Senator by clicking here and your Representative by clicking here. As you may know, the Senate Appropriations Committee has approved a bill that zeroed out funding for the CDC's Youth Violence Prevention activities—suddenly and without input. Elimination of this $19.7 million in funding will have a devastating impact on efforts to prevent violence across the country and compromise decades of work. Without this funding stream, many efforts that help keep our young people safe are in jeopardy: among them is Prevention Institute’s UNITY (Urban Networks to Increase Thriving Youth) initiative. UNITY works with cities all over the country to prevent violence before it occurs. To find out more, read UNITY’s newest publication: Fact Sheet: Links Between Violence and Health Equity which describes violence and lack of safety as a health equity issue, and demonstrates how preventing violence is an important component of any effort to achieve health equity and create healthy communities. You can also read previously released publications, including Fact Sheets: Links Between Violence and Chronic Diseases, Mental Illness and Poor Learning.  If you haven’t forwarded this alert to your colleagues please do so now. Thank you again for keeping the message to your elected officials strong! New to the effort or want to learn more? Check out our Fact Sheet on Public Health Funding for Youth Violence Prevention Get the latest updates here: Preventing Violence - Advocacy

URGENT CALL TO ACTION: Support the Closure of IYC-Murphysboro

Greetings!

Last week, the Annie E. Casey Foundation issued a new report titled "No Place for Kids: The Case for Reducing Juvenile Incarceration". The report "demonstrates that America's heavy reliance on juvenile incarceration has not paid off, and in fact, is a failed strategy for combating youth crime." 

Here in Illinois, according to an analysis of state records by the Juvenile Justice Initiative, the average daily population for youth prisons in the state was 1,113 in fiscal year 2011, down from 1,603 in fiscal year 2005 and 1,192 in fiscal year 2010. The same analysis estimates operation costs for the facilities as $92,257 per bed for fiscal year 2011.

On September 8th, Governor Pat Quinn announced that he would recommend closing IYC-Murphysboro this fiscal year. This will save the state $3.1 million in just FY12. For specific information about IYC-Murphysboro, click here.

By Richard Ross We support the closure of IYC-Murphysboro and are asking each of you to add your voice to the mix. On October 12th, a  a hearing on the closure of IYC-Murphysboro will be held at 10:30 am. While it is a long way away for many of us to travel to this hearing, it is CRITICAL that we make our voices heard to the Committee organizing the hearing AS SOON AS POSSIBLE. We are asking that the Commission support Governor Quinn's decision to close IYC-Murphysboro.  For information about where to send your e-mails and who to call to support the decision to close IYC-Murphysboro, please click HERE.

Again, please find out who to call and who to send your e-mails to HERE. In addition, please join us on October 29th for a "Teach-In to Close Youth Prisons in Illinois. This is our time to make a tangible difference in the movement to end youth incarceration.

 

Sincerely,

 

Mariame Kaba
Project NIA