Democratic Budget is Pro "Choices"

Created by: Jillian

Late Monday evening and early Tuesday morning, the House and Senate respectively passed a budget which includes funding for teen pregnancy prevention programs and the fetal & infant mortality review that the Governor's budget had proposed to eliminate completely.

The funding for teen pregnancy prevention block grants supports programs around the state that work directly with youth to reduce unintended teen pregnancy. The Governor's proposed elimination of this funding and essentially these programs was extremely short sighted. The budget that was passed last night allocated over $2 million to teen pregnancy prevention programs--a long term investment that will benefit the state.

In addition to teen pregnancy prevention programs, the budget that passed both houses last night also funded the state's Fetal & Infant Mortality Review. Fetal & infant mortality review is an important public health strategy for identifying risk factors for perinatal morbidity and mortality and for obtaining information that can be used to design community interventions to improve the health of women and infants.

The overall goal of the Fetal & Infant Mortality Review is to enhance the health and well-being of women, infants and families by improving the community resources and service delivery systems. The Governor's proposed elimination of this program would have been a huge disservice to our state, in particular, our state's racial and ethnic minorities who experience greater numbers of fetal and infant death.

So...thank you to the democratic leadership for passing a budget that supports reproductive choices, recognizing the importance of a woman's right to prevent an unintended pregnancy or to bear a healthy child.

The Governor's office has five days to either sign or veto the budget bill or it will automatically become law.