Rape crisis centers are finally getting funding from Pennsylvania’s budget, but advocates say it’s not enough to support survivors

Rape crisis centers in the Philadelphia region are sounding the alarm that the slight increase in funding in the recently passed state budget won’t be enough to sustain or improve crucial services for survivors of sexual assault.

The Pennsylvania Coalition to Advance Respect (PCAR), which funds rape crisis centers via the state allocation, estimates centers will only see an average increase of $5,300 from the state to support their work assisting victims of sexual violence.

The Philadelphia Center Against Sexual Violence had to lay off most of its staff and reduce services due to the nearly five-month state budget impasse. And while leaders in the region appreciate the funding — the first increase for rape crisis centers in years — it’s only a fraction of what Philly’s only rape crisis center says it needs to survive.

“Even with the budget now passed, the funding increase is minimal compared to the overwhelming need,” said LaQuisha Anthony, senior manager of advocacy at the center, in a news release last week. The center is known as WOAR, the initials of its former name, Women Organized Against Rape.

Now advocates in Philadelphia and the suburbs are turning their focus to next year’s budget, pushing for an $8 million increase in state funding to rape crisis centers, which, among other services, offer victim advocacy, legal services, and crisis hotlines. A surge in funding will help provide stability for survivors and adequately compensate staff who dedicate their lives to this work.

“An $8 million increase would help ensure that every survivor across the Commonwealth, urban, suburban, and rural, has access to care, advocacy, and prevention,” said Joyce Lukima, coalition director and chief operating officer at PCAR, in a statement.

More than $12 million of a $50.1 billion state budget was allocated to rape crisis this year, a $250,000 increase from last year. Lukima said this $250,000 will be split among 47 rape crisis centers in the state.

In a statement, a spokesperson for the Pennsylvania Department of Human Services, which oversees rape crisis center funding, highlighted Gov. Josh Shapiro’s history of support for survivors of sexual violence.

“The final budget reflects the realities of working with one of the only divided legislatures in the entire country – but Gov. Shapiro will continue to fight for survivors and the Commonwealth’s rape crisis centers," said Ali Fogarty, the DHS spokesperson.

Victim services centers in the suburbs, which also offer rape crisis services, are echoing WOAR and PCAR’s message, highlighting the urgent need for greater funding. These suburban centers receive funding from additional sources because they support victims of other crimes.

“For now, we’re doing OK, but another year of no increase in funding while the cost of living is going up has a significant impact on our staff as well as our organization,” said Penelope Ettinger, executive director of Network of Victim Assistance - Bucks County.

While Pennsylvania lawmakers were failing to come to an agreement on a far overdue state budget last month, rape crisis centers in Philadelphia and the suburbs were trying to make ends meet and provide services to survivors of sexual violence.

For instance, the Victim Services Center of Montgomery County had to use a line of credit, delay bill payments, institute a hiring freeze, increase the number of interns, and commit to “triaging services,” said Mary Onama, executive director.

“If they hadn’t passed the budget the time that they did, by December or January, we would have had to close, because we couldn’t go much longer,” Onama added.

At the Crime Victims’ Center of Chester County, it “added a layer of stress to an already very stressful job,” though the center did not have to reduce services, said Christine Zaccarelli, the organization’s CEO.

And at WOAR, the changes were drastic.

The nonprofit cut their 30-person staff and paused counseling and therapy services and prevention-education programs. Other programming was kept afloat by the handful of staff members that remained.

WOAR’s release last week said the closure of therapy and counseling services left “106 individuals wait-listed, 33 group clients waiting for services to resume, and eight child clients referred elsewhere for care.”

The center has been serving Philadelphia since 1971 and was one of the first rape crisis centers in the United States, according to the organization. Between January and October, the center said it responded to 3,820 calls on its crisis hotline.

But there have been recent shake-ups at the nonprofit, including the hiring of Gabriella Fontan, WOAR’S executive director, which was announced roughly a week before layoffs began in October. Prior to Fontan, the center had two interim executive directors since 2022.

The dysfunctional approval of the state budget, though, will have lingering effects on WOAR, warning in the news release that without a “long-term, sustainable investment,” the center won’t be able to meet a rising demand for resources.

The Bridge Loan, from the Pa. Treasury Department, provided WOAR funding owed for July through September, but it still wasn’t enough to return WOAR to full capacity, said Demetrius Archer, PCAR’s communications director. The center also brought back two employees this month, but it’s still in need of community support and is hoping to bring back more staff when possible.

“When services are underfunded, survivors and entire communities feel the impact,” said Fontan in the news release. “In a city as large and diverse as Philadelphia, every minute counts when someone is in crisis. Survivors deserve to know that when they reach out for help, someone will be there to answer.”

At Temple University’s campus Tuesday, student advocates bundled up in their coats, hats, and scarves and gathered at the Bell Tower to discuss an anti-sexual violence state bill they helped develop.

The Every Voice Bill, which primarily focuses on sexual violence prevention resources on college campuses, is even more important now that survivor services from WOAR are “unstable,” said Bella Kwok, a senior criminal justice major and president of Temple’s Student Activists Against Sexual Assault, in an interview prior to Tuesday’s event

“This bill would ensure that stability at least on an institutional level,” Kwok said.

Kwok is not the only one who is turning their attention to Harrisburg. PCAR and other rape crisis centers are continuing their push for next year’s budget to include an $8 million increase in the Pa. DHS line item for rape crisis.

As the first increase for rape crisis centers in a few years, the new budget’s funding gives advocates “hope,” even if the amount is “disappointing,” said Zaccarelli, of the Crime Victims’ Center of Chester County.

“Maybe our advocacy is making a little bit of a difference and shining a light on survivors and their needs and how important our centers are in the community,” Zaccarelli said.

Ettinger said that Bucks County’s state lawmakers have been supportive of NOVA Bucks, which had to place a hiring freeze on some positions and issue “significant” restrictions on spending due to the impasse, but that a lack of increased funding from the state is “very telling.”

“I believe that the fact that the state did not allocate a significant increase is very telling to what they believe, where they put it on the priority list,” Ettinger said.

For his part, Shapiro signed Act 122 in October 2024, which aimed to increase transparency by requiring a statewide electronic system to track evidence kits for sexual assaults, Fogarty, the DHS spokesperson said. And in December 2023, he signed Act 59, which aims to improve access to treatment for survivors of sexual assault.

It’s a “societal” problem, not a government problem, said Vincent Davalos, interim executive director of the Delaware County Victim Assistance Center.

“When we talk about sexual violence, the first thought is, of most people, is to say ‘Maybe this didn’t happen,” Davalos said. “And even if they do believe it happens… it’s just a really difficult topic for people to engage and talk about it plainly.”

This week, victim services leaders across Pennsylvania will gather in Harrisburg for an annual conference to address funding challenges among other concerns, Davalos said, noting that with more funding, his center could improve staff retention.

But this year, the newly passed state budget is likely to be top of mind.

“I think money is going to be a big topic,” Davalos said.