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Published on 09/28/1998 All articles from this issue

Improving domestic violence picture

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By Joanne Griffith Domingue / Town Crier Staff Writer

Local officials involved in county conference

When domestic violence goes on between mom and dad, it affects the children.

This theme wove its way throughout the sixth annual county conference on domestic violence, "Ending Family Violence: The Impact on Children and Families," held last Thursday and Friday at the Fairmont Hotel in San Jose.

Len Edwards, keynote speaker and supervising judge of the Santa Clara County Juvenile Court, presented a new book, "Family Violence: Emerging Programs for Battered Mothers and their Children" at the event.

"This will help us improve the ways we hold batterers accountable and the ways we protect children," Edwards, a Los Altos Hills resident, told the audience of attorneys, social workers, law enforcement officials and those who work with victims of domestic violence.

"It will help us understand the nexus of child abuse and domestic violence and its impact on children," he said.

"How can a behavior that is so commonplace be so invisible?" said County Supervisor Joe Simitian as he introduced Edwards. Simitian, who represents Los Altos and Los Altos Hills on the county board of supervisors, said he overhead that question one day in the supervisors' chambers.

"Thank you for the visibility," he said to the event planners, who included Los Altos Police Chief Lucy Carlton.

The two-day event was sponsored by the Santa Clara County Board of Supervisors and the county's Domestic Violence Council. The council began in 1990 through efforts led by Edwards. Last year Carlton was chairwoman of the council.

"Santa Clara County is known throughout the country for the most comprehensive program in the country," said Meredith Hofford, also a keynote speaker, who came from the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges.

Affects on children can be extensive, leaders reported.

"Children hear the violence, they feel it, they wake up and see the results," said Carol Stevenson, an attorney with the Los Altos-based David and Lucile Packard Foundation. The Packard Foundation was one of the sponsors of the two-day conference, and Stevenson was also a keynote speaker.

"Problems of children who witness domestic violence include behavior and emotional," Stevenson said. "They have lower skills and develop attitudes to support using violence," she said.

The difficult part is finding solutions for the problems. That's where the book, "Emerging Programs," that received funding from the Packard Foundation, comes in. It highlights 29 programs, throughout the country, that offer ways that work, Edwards said.

These examples will "help us create a vision to go do something about it," Edwards.

"Answers are not obvious. It's not an easy solution - that's how complex this is."

One new source of help is available from the Support Network of Battered Women. This Mountain View-based agency that serves women in Los Altos and Los Altos Hills, now offers an 800 phone number victims may call for help.

"We wondered how we could make it easy for women," said Lisa Breen, executive director of the Support Network, who attended the conference.

"If you flee your house and have no change," Breen said, how do you make a call? Plus, she said, "Batterers check phone bills. We are there for women seven days a week. The call is free, it's confidential and no one can track it."

The number is 1-800-572-2787.