Domestic Violence Visits the Job
Silent Until It's Too Painful

By MEREDITH KOLODNER

No one in the municipal hospital where Serena works knows why she filed for divorce last month after 32 years of marriage, or even that she did it.

The Chief-Leader/Pat Arnow OPENED MELS TO BATTERED WOMEN: Sheila Manashe, who is retiring as the director of social services at DC 37's Municipal Employees Legal Services after 35 years of service, helped to establish the unit's domestic violence benefits. She said when MELS started in 1972, domestic violence wasn't something that was discussed openly. "People whispered about it," she remarked.

They don't know about her discovery years earlier that certain brands of make-up cover bruises better than others. Or that most of her sick days were used for the times when even the thickest creams could not hide what had happened the night before.

Hundreds of Victims

Serena is one among hundreds of District Council 37 members who walk into its legal services unit each year looking for help with evictions, bankruptcy or divorce, but whose problems stem from a violent home life. Counselors at the union's Municipal Employees Legal Services (MELS) say that about half of the women who seek legal matrimonial assistance from them are also in the midst of surviving domestic violence.

"I would pray that God would take charge," said Serena, who asked that her real name not be used. "People said that He wouldn't give you more than you could take."

Her husband had beaten her before they emigrated to the U.S. in the 1990s. She got a job in a city hospital, and the abuse continued unabated, in front of her children and especially when her husband was drunk. It wasn't until a co-worker told her about the immigration assistance her son got from DC 37's legal unit that she took the first step: "I asked her, 'Do they help with divorce?' And she said, 'Oh yes,' but I didn't tell her anything else."

Serena had already been to Family Court to try and get a restraining order, but she had no legal representation. Many DC 37 members, whose average salaries are about $30,000 a year, fall into a legal income gap. They make too much to qualify for free legal services but too little to afford a private lawyer.

Promise Broken

Serena's husband promised the judge he would move out in two months, so the judge allowed him to continue to live in the apartment, but banned him from entering their bedroom.

"I would lock the bedroom, and put the ironing board behind the door," she explained, "but I was scared at night." One night, he violated the order of protection and threatened his wife with a gun. He wound up calling the police, who removed him from the home. Serena said he had not bothered her since.

The city worker says she knew she wanted to end the marriage, but that calling MELS was the hardest step. But on March 14, she met with a MELS lawyer and was referred to social worker Donna D'Andrea.

"When I spoke to Ms. D'Andrea, everything just poured out and I was just crying," she said, her voice choking. "She said to me, 'This time will pass,' and those words are what I am living by."

Happens to Men, Too

About half of the women who come into MELS seeking help with divorce are experiencing emotional or physical abuse, according to program staff. The lawyers screen all clients for possible domestic violence and then refer them to social workers for further counseling. In the past several years, MELS has begun to screen men as well as women, and currently men account for about 10 percent of their domestic violence cases.

The lawyers at MELS obtain over 100 orders of protection for members each year, but they caution that many women who were seriously injured or even killed had existing orders of protection.

"Many people select an alternate route," said Sheila Manashe, who was the director of MELS social services from 1972 until April of this year. "One has to be very careful in helping the person, and follow the lead of that person, because sometimes they need to do more to prepare to leave safely."

Almost all of the program's domestic violence clients also experience some related problems at work. Nationwide, about 75 percent of domestic violence survivors report harassment on the job by the abusive partner, and about half miss days due to injury, exhaustion or shame over their problems becoming public.

Work Was No Refuge

In one case, a woman and the husband who was beating her were both city Emergency Medical Service workers. She had left her husband but was afraid to go to work for fear of seeing him, and so her pay was being docked. She came to MELS because she was being served with an eviction notice and was threatened with being fired.

But like most legal services, MELS did not always provide domestic violence counseling. When the legal services program began in 1972 as a pilot program with funding from the Ford Foundation, domestic violence was not commonly recognized as a problem.

"Nowadays you walk into the subway and see signs about it," said Ms. Manashe. "That didn't exist back then. People whispered about it."

In the late 1970s, the MELS social workers began identifying a large number of members who needed help getting restraining orders. In 1979 they began documenting the cases to show the growing need.

"Even colleagues of mine wouldn't quite believe it," explained Ms. Manashe. "We tried to put an ad in the union newspaper, and it wasn't very easy."

Help a Union Benefit

But by 1981, the MELS advocates had convinced union leaders that the need was widespread, and domestic violence assistance became a defined benefit of MELS.

Serena said while it was hard for her to come forward, it had felt near-impossible in the past.

"At that time, it was not a big thing, domestic violence," she said. "You would just call in sick if you had a blue eye. It was referred to as 'husband and wife business,' and people didn't interfere."

Serena says her children, who are now grown, are supportive of her decision to leave her husband. Her son recently reminded her of how he and his sister used to be awakened by the noise caused by their father beating her in the middle of the night.

"I told him I didn't remember that," Serena recalled, "and he said, 'That's because you had to block it all out.'''

She said that after her first visit to the MELS office, she walked out comforted but reeling from the stories that had come out of her own mouth. "Then I was thinking of my age," said Serena, who is 60, as she began to weep. "When I was walking to the subway, and I thought it's been so many years, and at this age I want to have some peace."

The MELS lawyers filed a petition for divorce on her behalf on May 30. She said she will continue to work at the hospital and volunteer at her church, where the other women she works with used to pray for her after she told them what was happening in her home. Serena said the work she does teaching adult education to people in the community means a lot to her.

"I teach them and help them to get their G.E.D.s," she said. "It's never too late to start over, really."