Queer Survivor Council to
Advise Safespace   "  

new resource being set up by
SafeSpace, a “Queer Survivor
Council," will advise the anti-violence
agency on policies, service gaps, and other
concerns, according to Resource Coordinator
Connie Beal, an Americorps Vista worker with
the group. In addition the council will be the
source for a speakers bureau of survivors of
domestic and anti-lgbt violence to share their
experiences in training settings.

“The Women’s Rape Crisis Center
and the [statewide] Domestic Violence
Network have survivor councils,” Beal noted.
Those organizations provide speakers who
have suffered sexual assault and other vio-
lence to remind agency staff and volunteers of
the all too real experiences and needs of con-
stituents they seek to help. However, “It’s very
rare to have [a speaker] who is queer.”

The aim of the project is to “help us
stay grassroots, to keep active, to empower
survivors, to educate people in the speakers
bureau, to provide advice, and for survivors to
have a say,” Beal explained. The Queer
Survivor Council will be launched in October,
during Domestic Violence Awareness month.

“Our survivors lead us, queer sur-
vivors especially,” she added. In a speakers
bureau role, they can address sexual and gen-

der identity questions that can arise following
an incidence of violence, particularly when the
violence has an anti-lgbt component, such as
the use of anti-gay, anti-lesbian, or anti-trans .
epithets during an assault. ,

According to its web site, SafeSpace
provides information, support, referrals and '3
advocacy to lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgen-
der, queer, and questioning survivors of physi-
cal, sexual, and emotional violence across
Vermont. Advocates may meet with survivors
face-to-face, help access protection orders, and
accompany survivors to court or to the hospi-
tal. ’

SafeSpace also identifies itself as a
resource for the community regarding lgbtqq
physical, sexual and emotional violence. The
agency works to reduce barriers for people to
access help and/or information through other
agencies and institutions. The group is active
statewide, with offices in Burlington.

“We are survivor-centered,” declared

_ SafeSpace Director Kara DeLeonardis. “We

are really. accountable, and the Survivor
Council will help us continue to be true to the
social change part of our purpose.”
DeLeonardis noted that the anti-vio-
lencemovement has become increasingly pro—.

fessionalized, implying the potential for dis-. . »

Kara DeLeonardis (left) and Connie Beal of Safespace announced the
formation of a Queer Survivor council.

tance between the service providers and their
clients. “A lot of us [professionals] are sur-
vivors but that’s not our primary focus," she
added. /
“The real question a Survivor

Council can answer is, ‘Are we doing what
they need us to do?”’ DeLeonardis explained.
The agency will look to the council for feed-
back on their web site, the effectiveness of
their outreach efforts, and whether staffing the
agency’s “warrnline” 24 hours a day should
become a priority, among other concerns. ’ '

    

SafeSpace is considering “a couple
of models” for choosing members of the coun-
cil, which might include community activists
as well as queer survivors. The council will
not be limited to the agency’s volunteers,
board members and staff.

" Anyone interested in helping to form
the council or in serving on it may contact
Kara DeLeonardis at SafeSpace: 863-0003 , or
Kara@safespacevt.org. For more information
on SafeSpace, visit their web site: www.safe-
spacevt.org. V

VT Freedom to Marry HiresiFie|d.

Director

s of August 1, the Vermont
AFreedom to Marry Task Force

will have the services of a
paid field director for the first time.
VFMTF president Beth Robinson said
in an interview that a grant from the
Civil Marriage Collaborative of the
Proteus Foundation allowed the group
to hire Robyn Maguire. The group is
also looking for office space, although
the grant request for that was not
funded.

Maguire, who moved to

Vermont in May for family reasons,
most recently worked for the Freedom
to Marry Coalition in Massachusetts as
the director of field development and

training. After the Massachusetts
Supreme Court’s Goodrich decision
mandating full access for sarne-sex
couples to marriage, Maguire worked
in close collaboration with another
Vermont resident, Mass Equality’s
Marty Rouse.

“It’s exciting to come back
to Vermont where this process all
began,” Maguire said in an interview
in mid-July. “Civil Union puts Vermont
ahead of the game, as it shot?/s that the
state clearly values recognizing same
sex-couples and honoring their rela-
tionships.”

Robinson said that Maguire
will work three-quarters time to help

move the marriage conversation in the
state forward. “For awhile we’ve been
in a holding pattern, playing defense
on civil unions. We’re not in a holding
pattern any more.”

The Baker v. State lawyer
added that she’s less worried about a
caustic backlash over moving from
civil union to marriage. “More
Vermonters support same sex marriage
than ever before,” Robinson explained,
noting a November 2004 AP election-
day poll that found 40 percent of
Vermont voters said they supported

’ marriage and.37 percent supported

civil unions, with another 21 percent
supporting no recognition for same-sex

couples. In 2000, the year the first-in-
the-nation civil union law took effect,
polling showed an even split of 49 per-
cent for civil unions, and 49 percent
against.

“Nationally we’re not lead-
ing the pack,” Robinson said. “To our
immediate north, there’s marriage
[equality]. To our immediate south
there’s marriage. The sky isn’t falling,
and it's the same sky here.” A reinvigo-
rated campaign for marriage equality,
she suggested, would be hard, but not
as ugly as the “Take Back Vermont”
and “Listen to the People” civil union
backlash.

“We hope to build enough
of a base of support, of enough depth
and breadth, to assure legislators that
[passing] a marriage bill won’t result in
a backlash,” Robinson said.

The reinvigorated organiza-

tion is working on a new DVD and has
already printed a new brochure focus-
ing on the differences between mar-
riage and civil union. The group plans
to have a volunteer-staffed booth at the
Addison County Field Days, the
Tunbridge and Champlain Valley fairs,
and at the State Fair in Rutland.

As the organization notes on
its web site, “not all VFMTF support-
ers embrace the institution of marriage;
some do, and some don’t. The core
values that unite VFMTF are the
beliefs that gay and lesbian Vermonters
should have the same legal choices as
our heterosexual counterparts, and that
laws which treat us and our relation-
ships as second class denigrate all of

us, regardless of our desire to marry.”
V

Treat Pot Like Booze and
Economists Say

ontpelier - In a report released
in June, Dr. Jeffrey Miron,
visiting professor of econom-

ics at Harvard University, estimated that
replacing marijuana prohibition with a
system of taxation and regulation similar
to that used for alcoholic beverages
would produce combined savings and
tax revenues of between $10 billion and
$14 billion per year nationally and from
$8.3 million to $9.4 ‘million or more in
Vermont.

Vermont Marijuana Policy
Project State Organizer Nancy Lynch
urged Vermonters to consider how these

savings and revenues could be used I
locally. Nationally, a group of more than
500 distinguished economists - led by
Nobel Prize-winner Dr. Milton Friedman
- released an open letter to President
Bush and other public officials calling
for “an open and honest debate about
marijuana prohibition,” adding, “We
believe such a debate will favor a regime
in which marijuana is legal but taxed and
regulated like other goods.” '

“\Vith Verrnont’s Medicaid
program facing a 2006 shortfall of up to
$70 million, we need to look closely at
how we’re spending our money and

Save $$$.

whether we’re getting our money’s
worth,” Lynch said. “A system of taxa-
tion and common-sense regulation will
not only save money that Vermont des-
perately needs for health care and other
programs, it will give our state better
control over marijuana.”

Legislation to regulate mari-
juana was introduced in the Vermont
House by Rep. Vlfinston Dowland (P-
Derby Line). The bill, cosponsored by
Rep. David Deen (D-Westrriinster), did
not make it out of committee before the
end of the first session of the legislative
biennium.

Using data from a variety of,
federal and state government sources,
Miron’s paper, “The Budgetary
Implications of Marijuana Prohibition,”
concludes that replacing marijuana pro-
hibition with a system of legal regulation
would save Vermont approximately $6.6
rriillion annually in government expendi-
tures on prohibition enforcement, while
taxation of regulated marijuana sales
would raise between $1.7 million and
$2.8 million in new revenue if marijuana
were taxed like ordinary consumer
goods. Revenue would increase if mari-
juana were taxed at the higher rates that
apply to tobacco and alcohol.

Lynch admitted in an inter-
view that the savings figures do not
reflect the costs of setting up regulatory
agencies, hiring inspectors, establishing

product standards, or promulgating rules
for marijuana production and sale.
Further, the costs for enforcement, per-
haps along the model of alcohol enforce-
ment, have not been taken into account,
including testing of unauthorized users,
their arrest, prosecution, and incarcera-
tion for those found guilty of violating
regulations. '

While Miron notes that many
factors beyond costs and tax revenues
would need to be considered in evaluat-
ing possible changes in marijuana laws,
he said, “These budgetary impacts
should be included in any rational debate
about marijuana policy.”

Miron’s report is available at
http://www.prohibitioncosts.org. V