Calls to Action
DOVE's mission centers around hope, healing, safety, and social change. As an anti-violence organization, we are dedicated to serving the needs of survivors and advocating for peace, justice, and equity through legislation that affects the everyday lives of survivors.
We ask our supporters to please join us in these calls to actions as a way to further advocate for survivors in the long-term.
Support the VOCA Bridge
We urgently need you to contact the MA Budget Conference Committee to support inclusion of the VOCA Bridge in their FY 2023 budget. The Massachusetts Office for Victim Assistance (MOVA) has recently had to make grant awards with funding cuts implemented, because at present there is a shortfall of $21m for FY 2023 – the first of 3 years of cuts. For DOVE, this cut across 3 contracts amounts to 33% of our VOCA funding -- $271,000 in FY 2023 alone. This is a dramatic cut and will impact DOVE’s ability to provide safety planning, contact victims after the police have gone to a home on a DV call, assist survivors to seek and secure housing, and a range of other services we provide every day. Click on the Advocacy Toolkit below to contact MA Budget Conference Committee Representatives with the provided prompts!
Take action and support the Healthy Youth Act (S.2541)!
This Act would provide a framework for schools that teach sex education to include: comprehensive, age appropriate, and medically accurate information; content and material that is LGBTQIA+ inclusive; and healthy relationships, boundaries, and consent. You can take action through this form provided by Fenway Health below.
Take Action Against Gun Violence
Intimate partner violence and gun violence in the U.S. are inextricably linked. Abusers with firearms are five times more likely to kill their victims, and guns further exacerbate the power and control dynamic used by abusers to inflict emotional abuse and exert coercive control over their victims.
Every month, an average of 70 women are shot and killed by an intimate partner. Nearly 1 million women alive today have reported being shot or shot at by intimate partners, and 4.5 million women have reported being threatened with a gun by an intimate partner. In more than half of mass shootings over the past decade, the perpetrator shot a current or former intimate partner or family member as part of the rampage. The ripple effects of firearms in the hands of an abuser extend far beyond the intimate relationship—affecting children who witness or live with it and the family members, coworkers, and law enforcement officers who respond to it.
What can you do? Check out Everytown's multitude of action steps and join community action groups. Send a message to your senators to turn the bipartisan gun safety plan into law now.