It’s been almost two years since lawmakers decided to impose a new fine on convicted domestic abusers and pass on the money to victims.
But the state’s emergency shelters have yet to see a single dollar. Almost $20,000 worth in accrued fines has been held up in the Department of Health and Human Services for months, with little explanation.
“We have not gotten an update in terms of why it is taking so long,” said Amanda Grady Sexton, with the N.H. Coalition Against Domestic and Sexual Violence.
Lawmakers approved the fine in 2015 to boost funding for the state’s 13 emergency domestic violence shelters, which are often overcrowded. The shelters had to turn away more than 1,000 people seeking help between 2014 and 2015 due to lack of space. Since then, the numbers have only grown. Almost 1,400 adults and 1,204 children were turned away from emergency shelters between October 2015 and September 2016 due to lack of space, according to coalition statistics.
When victims who need emergency shelter are turned away, they have few options: sometimes they stay with a friend or relative, some live in their cars, some return to an abusive household.
“These people are depending on us getting this right,” Grady Sexton said.
The fine has been plagued with problems from the start.
The circuit courts didn’t collect the mandatory $50 fee from all convicted offenders, as required by the law that took effect July 2015. To cover the uncollected money, the court system cut a $7,200 check from its own funds.
It then sent that money, along with an additional $12,450 raised from offenders, to the Department of Health and Human Services. The dollars then sat at the state agency for months.
Spokesman Jake Leon said last July the department needed to amend its contract with the coalition before any money could be released. He said the change would happen in September. But it’s now January, and nothing has materialized.
In a statement recently, Leon said the department plans to bring the contract change to the Executive Council in February.
Council approval would release the money to the coalition, which distributes it to the crisis centers. By the time the money actually makes it to the shelters, it may be time for the whole cycle to begin anew. The state’s fiscal year, when the fines are collected, ends June 30.
New Hampshire’s congressional delegation is entirely female. At the state level, women make up less than one-third of legislators in Concord. Still, the Granite State still ranks high above the national average of 24.4 percent female representation.
Women make up one third of the state Senate. In the 400-member House, women hold 113 seats.
Party isn’t a determining factor. Four Democratic and four Republican women are in the state Senate, while 68 Democratic women and 45 Republican women are in the House.
The number in the House has been largely steady over the past decade, dropping to 97 in the 2011-12 session and reaching a height of 140 in the 2007-08 and 2009-10 session years.
While women serve on almost all committees, they are notably absent from three of the most powerful budget-related Senate committees.
The Senate Finance, Ways and Means and Capital Budget have no female members. The committees deal primarily with the state budget, which is being crafted this year.
(Allie Morris can be reached at 369-3307 or amorris@cmonitor.com.)