Confidentiality Wins in PA

The 23rd of December, 1981, marked an important and largely unheralded victory for women and rape crisis centers in Pennsylvania. On that day, Governor Thornburgh of Pennsylvania signed into law an act providing for "confidential communications to counselors of sexual assault victims". It then became illegal for a rape crisis counselor to release information or to be subpoenaed to testify to anything that' has been said in a counseling session. This law insures. that rape victims will have absolute confidentiality when they turn to a rape crisis center in Pennsylvania for assistance.

The struggle began in July 1980, when a Pittsburgh “Action Against Rape (PAAR) staff member was serving as an advocate (supportive person) for the victim in a rape case. On the 10th of July, the defense attorney, in the middle of the trial, demanded access to PAAR's counseling records. He argued that the woman may have told a PAAR counselor something other than what she had testified to in court. PAAR refused on the principle that anything said to it was said in the belief that it would be held confidential,. In accordance with a form to that effect which PAAR employees and volunteers had consistently been re"quired to sign.

Ms.

Anne Pride, Director of PAAR, refused to turn over the counseling record as ordered by the judge. Threatened with jail for contempt of court; Pride, through her attorney Ann Lee Begler, took the matter to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, which agreed to review the issue. PAAR wanted a decision that guaranteed rape victims total confidentiality, or. "absolute privilege". In the months that followed, support for PAAR's position flowed in from all segments of the community, including favorable media coverage and letters from women's centers, rape crisis centers, police departments, YWCA's and many individuals.

The Pennsylvania Supreme Court reviewed the case in October 1980 and in January 1981 issued its ruling. The Court ruled that, although the counseling record could not be introduced into court; the presiding judge had the right to look at the record to determine whether or not there was a "direct statement" that would be relevant to the defense and admissible in court, thus leaving the discretion to the presiding judge.

The decision was not what PAAR and the other rape crisis centers across the state were fighting for. The basic issue, the right of a woman to speak with a rape counselor in confidence, had not been dealt with. A rape victim had no assurance that her conver-

sation would not at some future time become public knowledge.

The consequences of this uncertainty quickly became apparent. The Center was flooded by subpoenas and calls from former clients expressing concern over the confidentiality of their records. Another rape crisis center reported that it had burned all its counseling records in order to preserve the privacy it had promised its clients.

Both PAAR and the Pennsylvania Coalition

Against Rape then approached the Pennsylvania State Legislature, and several bills designed to pro tect the confidential relationship between rape counselor and rape victim were introduced. While the legislature debated the issue, several rape trials in Pennsylvania relied upon the Supreme Court's decision and in three cases, records were turned over to the defense.

The Pennsylvania Legislature put an end to the confusion by passing a law which, as of February 22, 1982, guaranteed absolute privilege between counselor and victim. Pennsylvania, the only state in the U.S. to have such a law, has set a precedent. The time has come for the rest of the states to follow suit.

Reagan Backs Off on EEOC

The Reagan Administration has decided to hold off on revisions that would have weakened affirmative action regulations for federal contractors. ·The administration's backdown resulted, at least in part, from pressure exerted by women's and civil

Hurrisburg Women's News

rights advocates opposed to the rule changes. White House officials apparently feared that going ahead with the proposals in an election year would further aggravate affirmative action supporters, and create problems at the ballot box.

rently, all businesses must comply with Equal Employment Opportunity Commission guidelines to be considered for federal contracts.

While the temporary withdrawal of the proposed changes can be viewed as a victory for the women's and civil rights forces that expressed adamant opposition to the easing of the regulations, it is important to remember that the administration's decision is temporary. Martin Gerry, counsel to a group of 34 moderate Republican House members, told the Wall Street Journal that "They're going back to the drawing board and coming back with something new".

Some even speculate that after the election, the administration may propose even more devastating changes in EEOC rules. An attorney for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce told the Journal that "the department might rethink its stance on back pay as well as its approach for targeting contractors for compliance reviews".

In order to assure that these proposals will not be reactivated or worse, we must keep up our pressure

on:

James Cisco

Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs

U.S. Department of Labor Washington, D.C. 20210

and on other government officials.

The revisions, proposed last April by Secretary of Johnson Seeks

Labor Ray Donovan, would have weakened compliance regulations for small businesses. In addition, the 6.9 percent goal for women in construction would have been altered to apply to construction as a whole rather than to each individual trade, and to entrylevel positions only rather than all job levels. Cur-

MANA for Midwives

In an effort to improve the quality of maternal/infant health care in the United States, midwives from all over the country recently joined together in an unprecedented organization, The Midwives' Alliance of North America (MANA). Certified nurse midwives and lay midwives from all parts of the U.S. formed the group in Lexington, Kentucky in April of this year.

MANA was founded both to build cooperation among midwives and to promote midwifery and natural childbirth as a quality health care option for women and their families. Its intent is to form an identifiable and cohesive organization representing the professional midwife on a regional, national, and international basis.

The idea for such an organization developed from an October, 1981 meeting in Washington, D.C. between nurse-midwives and lay midwives. The core group of midwives present (from Washington,

California, Texas, Tennessee, Georgia and Massachusetts) agreed on the need for a professional organization which would create a strong alliance among all midwives. Open meetings in Lexington identified the following needs: improved. communication and support among. North American midwives; standards for education, training and basic competency for midwives; midwifery education programs; research in midwifery care; and communication and interaction with other groups, both professional and non-professional, concerned with health care of women and their families.

Membership in MANA is open to all midwives, students and supporters. In the future, membership may be categorized, and some kind of certification process made available to practicing midwives. The communication vehicle for MANA will be The Practicing Midwife Journal. A national conference is planned for October. For further information, contact Edine Frohman, (615) 964-3571.

NOW Presidency

Sonia Johnson, excommunicated from the Mormon Church in 1979 because of her activism on behalf of the ERA and one of those who fasted in Illinois for its passage, is running for President of NOW in its October election. Johnson believes that NOW must apply the tactics learned with the ERA to all the issues addressed by NOW. Those issues must be broadened: "I believe it is time for NOW to get powerfully organized behind reproductive rights, lesbian rights, rights of minority women within the organization and in society, rural women, and child care; and against the feminization of poverty, ageism, and the epidemic of violence against women".

Johnson's platform is far more activist than has been NOW's tradition in the past. She believes that "confrontation is not only legitimate but essential if we are to succeed as a human rights movement, and that we must use all strategies which past successes in history have shown were necessary to win justice-always with the understanding that no one tactic works in isolation, that all are necessary and must be used in conjunction with one another. I also believe we must be totally committed to the. philosophy of nonviolence".

To date, no one has filed to run against Johnson for the NOW presidency.

September, 1982/What She Wants/Page 3