Dear Members of the end-violence network, I'm glad to hear from you again, and I would like to share with you some of this year's achievements.
As many of you already knows, Alternativas Pac�ficas is a non-profit organization that works in M�xico in a shelter for battered women, promoting the importance of opening Shelters for Battered Women, and sharing our Attention Program with governmental or civil groups interested in this work. When we opened our Shelter in Monterrey in 1996, the knowledge of this kind of programs were almost unknown in our country, although many experts and professionals knew about the urgency of this services for a large group of women in a violent situation. With the cooperation of experts from Texas we start to create this Program we know share with colleges in other states of the Mexican Republic. In 1999 we knew about 3 other shelters that were opened in the country and we invited them to a meeting in order to see what we could do to help each other. In that occasion the group decided to start working together to solve cases of families in extreme danger and to share information about our criteria of attention in different areas, such as counseling, legal support, health and security problem solving. This year, and with the support of some agencies of the Federal Gov., we had our 4th meeting in Mexico City, November 12 to 14. More than 50 people participated and we know count 3 more shelters in the country. The result of this reunion was a proposal we presented to some people that work in different areas of the Government, the media, the Congress and some other non-profit organizations. In this five years I have seen a few changes in M�xico, and one of those is precisely the interest in family violence on the public agenda, and their interest to support non-profit organizations in order to grow and improve our services to the community. In other words, we are working side by side, learning form each other about how to maximize the resources in favor of the families in a violent situation. Alternativas Pacificas plan for next year includes: - a prevention campaign in rural areas of the north region - growing our shelter - formalize the National Shelter's network - support other groups interested in shelters Since we in Monterrey are working on a proposal of a local television network, to use 30 minutes a week to talk about family violence, I would like to find previous experiences in other countries. I'll be glad to here about it. We plan to start with a 4 program project to see how the public respond. We'll keep in touch, and best wishes for all this next year. Alicia Leal Executive Director Alternativas Pacificas, A.C. Monterrey, N.L. M�xico. ***End-violence is sponsored by UNIFEM and receives generous support from ICAP*** To post a message, send it to: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To subscribe or unsubscribe, send a message to: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>. In the 1st line of the message type: subscribe end-violence OR type: unsubscribe end-violence Archives of previous End-violence messages can be found at: http://www.edc.org/GLG/end-violence/hypermail/
