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HIV/AIDS advocates ready for budget fight
by Matt Simonette
2015-04-12

This article shared 4515 times since Sun Apr 12, 2015
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Illinois health advocates have faced budget crises before, but rarely have circumstances seemed as dire as they do now, with service providers and advocates rallying against proposed cuts to the state's Health and Human Services budget.

"It seems like we've been doing this every year," said Daniel Frey, director of government relations for AIDS Foundation of Chicago ( AFC ) on April 8 at Center on Halsted. "This is different. We have a divided government and we have people who don't want to see the government grow."

Frey took part in a panel, sponsored by AFC, which focused on cuts to HIV/AIDS-related services. Other participants included Ramon Gardenhire, vice-president of Policy, AFC; state Rep. Greg Harris; Affinity Community Services Executive Director Kim Hunt; Patricia Johnson of Illinois Alliance for Sound AIDS Policy; and Kristin Keglovitz Baker, chief operating officer of Howard Brown Health Center.

There are about 43,500 persons living with HIV/AIDS in Illinois, and about 1,800 new infections every year, according to Frey. About one of every two infections is to a person of color. But HIV/AIDS resources geared for Black Illinoisans have been hit especially hard in the current and upcoming budget cycles. Monies previously allocated to the African American HIV/AIDS Response Fund were never forwarded to their intended grantees for FY 2015, leaving many of those organizations in dismal financial situations, and then Gov. Rauner's FY ( fiscal year ) 2016 budget cut the fund's allocation down to $500,000. Furthermore, an action in early spring suspended the FY 2015 allocation for the Illinois Department of Public Health's Brothers And Sisters United Against AIDS initiative.

"Most nonprofits are very small organizations," Hunt said. "Two-thirds have budgets under $500,000 with 40 percent under $100,000. Having funding not come through means that [agencies] had to lay off staff … It weakened the infrastructure in many communities that provide HIV-related services."

Also left aside was a program that would have made it easier for underserved persons at risk for infection to obtain the drug Truvada for use as Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis, or PrEP. That program, PrEP for Illinois, would have cost $1 million, "but the governor stopped it in its tracks," said John Peller, president and CEO of AFC.

Harris spoke out about comments Rauner made, wherein the governor indicated that he'd likely use cuts as bargaining tools in negotiations.

"You cannot use cuts that affect people who are ill, elderly or disabled to leverage your way in a democracy," Harris said. "All of us have to agree that we cannot allow one group of community interests to be pitted against each other. … There are going to be some cuts, but they have to be cuts that we agree on, and we have to find some new revenue."

Johnson, who has lived with HIV for 26 years, said that she was in an especially precarious situation: Her employment depends on that funding, and she herself utilizes the services that it provides.

"If they take away the money, I'm unemployed," Johnson said. "I cannot come to work, sit down and help somebody like me. … What do we have to offer them [then]? Nothing. One medication would have cost me $3,000 a month."

Johnson added that Rauner "needs to take a look at human lives, not statistics."

Harris said concerned residents and advocates would have to mount a lobbying campaign, similar to the one carried out on behalf of marriage equality, to make sure that the proposed cuts are not carried through: "Our next step is beginning to communicate to our members what these cuts mean."

Rauner's newly appointed Director of LGBT Affairs J. Marcos Peterson, also attended the forum and said that the governor was indeed concerned about the situation.

"We are setting up an LGBT working group with different organizations and we want to know more about your organizations as well. We do have a hard battle in front of us, so what we can do is work together so that we can come to a conclusion. …The struggles are real to the [governor's] office, so let's work together for a solution," Peterson said.

AFC is organizing two advocacy days in Springfield. The first is April 15, while the second is May 14. For information, visit www.aidschicago.org .


This article shared 4515 times since Sun Apr 12, 2015
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