Senate Resolution No. 874

BY: Senator WEBB

MEMORIALIZING Governor Kathy Hochul to proclaim
May 2, 2023, as Domestic Violence Awareness and
Prevention Day in the State of New York

WHEREAS, Domestic violence is a pattern of coercive behavior and
tactics used by someone against their intimate partner in an attempt to
gain or maintain power and control, and types of abuse can include
physical, sexual, psychological, technological and economic abuse; and

WHEREAS, Domestic violence is not limited to specific groups based
on race, socioeconomic status, gender identity, sex, sexual orientation,
ethnicity, age, religious affiliation, or social location, but rather is
perpetrated by abusers from all social groups; and

WHEREAS, On average, nearly 20 people per minute are physically
abused by an intimate partner in the United States -- more than 10
million people over the course of a year; and

WHEREAS, Approximately one in three women and one in four men have
experienced some form of domestic violence or interpersonal violence in
their lifetime, and one in ten women have been raped by an intimate
partner; and

WHEREAS, Due to systemic racism, racist policies, and racist
societal structures, both Black women and Black men experience intimate
partner violence at a disproportionately high rate, with 45.1% of Black
women and 40.1% of Black men experiencing intimate partner physical
violence, intimate partner sexual violence and/or intimate partner
stalking in their lifetimes; and

WHEREAS, Domestic violence affects the LGBTQ+ community at a rate
equal to or even greater than that experienced by the cisgender,
heterosexual community, with 43.8% of lesbian women and 26% of gay men
experiencing rape, physical violence and/or stalking by an intimate
partner at some point in their lifetime, and more than 54% of the
transgender and gender non-conforming community has reported
experiencing some form of intimate partner violence, with transgender
women of color experiencing heightened levels of violence; and

WHEREAS, More than four in five American Indian and Alaska Native
women and men have experienced violence in their lifetime, and more than
one in three have experienced violence in the past year; and

WHEREAS, Nearly 20.9% of female high school students and 13.4% of
male high school students report being physically or sexually abused by
a dating partner, and 43% of dating college women report experiencing
violent or abusive behaviors from their partner; and

WHEREAS, Researchers estimate that one in 15 children in the United
States are exposed to intimate partner violence, and children who
witness intimate partner violence growing up are three times more likely
as their peers to engage in violent behavior; and

WHEREAS, Domestic violence survivors experience a host of physical
and mental health-related consequences at far greater rates than their
counterparts who have not been abused; and

WHEREAS, New York State consistently has the greatest demand for
domestic violence support services in the country with 9,157 survivors
requesting services on just one day in 2022, and 951 unfulfilled service
requests because domestic violence service providers did not have the
resources or staff to provide such services; and

WHEREAS, In 2020, there were 165,577 orders of protection issued
that required entry in the New York State Registry; and

WHEREAS, The NYS Office of Children and Family Services reported
that nearly 48,000 survivors of domestic violence and their children
received services from New York residential and non-residential domestic
violence service providers, and more than 252,500 hotline calls were
received across the State in 2020; and

WHEREAS, According to the NYS Division of Criminal Justice Services,
there were 61 intimate partner homicides in New York State in 2020; and

WHEREAS, The cost of a single homicide is estimated at $17.25
million when considering medical care, lost future earnings, other
related public programming and services, and property damage and other
losses; and

WHEREAS, The economic burden of domestic violence in the United
States is staggering, with costs to the U.S. economy estimated to exceed
$8.3 billion annually, with 21-60 percent of victims of intimate partner
violence losing their jobs due to reasons stemming from the abuse; and

WHEREAS, Primary prevention strategies address the root causes and
conditions that make domestic violence possible, and public health
research has shown that implementing prevention activities at multiple
levels on the social ecology scale - individual, relationship,
community, and societal - will lead to lasting social change; and

WHEREAS, Primary prevention is focused on establishing gender
equality, cultivating, and promoting healthy relationship behaviors, and
changing conditions in communities and culture to stop domestic violence
before it starts; and

WHEREAS, Domestic violence advocates consistently provide
comprehensive and compassionate life-saving services, advocacy, and
support to survivors of domestic violence and their children, while
leading essential primary prevention efforts within their communities to
motivate the change needed to stop domestic violence from happening in
the first place; and

WHEREAS, As part of executing its mission, the New York State
Coalition Against Domestic Violence seeks to create and support the
social change necessary to prevent and confront all forms of domestic
violence, to ensure the availability and accessibility of innovative and
effective supports and services for all domestic violence survivors and
their families, and to dismantle oppression, end systemic racism and
uproot the inequities that foster violence; and

WHEREAS, New York State needs to continually and significantly
invest in services and supports for domestic violence survivors and
their families in order to meet the rising demand for assistance and to
continue progress toward ending domestic violence once and for all; now
therefore, be it

RESOLVED, That this Legislative Body pause in its deliberations to
memorialize Governor Kathy Hochul to proclaim May 2, 2023, as Domestic
Violence Awareness and Prevention Day in the State of New York; and be
it further

RESOLVED, That copies of this Resolution, suitably engrossed, be
transmitted to The Honorable Kathy Hochul, Governor of the State of New
York, and the New York State Coalition Against Domestic Violence.