Las Vegas Sun

March 29, 2024

Women rally for violence programs

Irate about congressional spending cuts that threaten domestic violence and stalking programs, local women's rights groups are asking Rep. John Ensign, R-Nev., for support.

At the same time, they lauded a Metro Police-sponsored domestic violence training session conducted Wednesday at the Golden Nugget.

As the partially federally funded Domestic Violence Training Seminar got under way, the coalition gathered on Fremont Street.

Lori Lipman Brown, a former Democratic state senator who championed an anti-stalking law, said after the rally: "This training is very helpful. Everyone should be against people getting hurt in their homes, including our congressman."

The group, including representatives from Stop All Stalkers and the National Organization for Women, rallied to bring the issue to the attention "of our congressman to fund these kinds of things," Brown said, "not to just say, 'I'm going to wait until someone gets hurt.'"

"I'm pretty frustrated when it comes to what I call people matters," Brown said. "We'd certainly like to see this kind of training continue."

Ensign said he, too, is in favor of training and funding such programs.

Ensign said he has voted for federal funding of programs such as battered women's shelters, but that one bill was vetoed by President Clinton and the other never made it out of the Senate.

"Domestic violence is serious," Ensign said. "We need to deal with it at not only the federal level, but at the state level, the local level, and in the private sector and community level. It has to be complete. This is a symptom of a sick society. This is all part of the moral decline of our country."

If the laws were better enforced, including enforcement of restraining orders, Brown said people like Sandy Johnson, 35, gunned down March 20 by her ex-boyfriend who lay in wait outside her mobile home on Nellis Boulevard, might still be alive.

"But it's understandable, with the lack of resources, that they can't always be enforced," Brown said.

Anne Golonka, local NOW president, agreed that the recent murders of women stemming from domestic violence could be prevented by funding domestic programs.

Ensign suggested that one of the causes of violence toward women is how they are portrayed in movies and television.

"As a society we need to reject that," he said. "That's how you work against it at the community and personal levels. The violence we see portrayed glorifies it and that feeds to people in our society. It's one of the causes we need to look at."

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