Mayor Gavin Newsom has rejected the latest $3 million cut to AIDS service agencies in the city's proposed budget for next year. Facing a projected $338 million deficit, Newsom had asked the Department of Public Health to come up with $10 million it could stand to lose. The $3 million cut proposed by Dr. Mitch Katz, DPH's director, would have come from the $11 million DPH pays to about 30 nonprofit AIDS service organizations.
Already, DPH is likely to take a $54 million hit next year, obliging it to close a homeless shelter, cut a visiting nurse program, and reduce operating room hours at the city's General Hospital. Katz had proposed shielding AIDS patients' medical care and housing from the budget axe, while pulling all money from HIV/AIDS-related food deliveries, legal aid, support groups, acupuncture, massage, and herbal therapy.
"If the city is saying that complimentary therapy is our priority, it would need to be the priority of all people who benefit," said Katz, noting that the city does not fund such services for patients with other chronic diseases.
"I just couldn't in good conscience justify it," Newsom said. "To the extent there are any cuts, they won't be at this magnitude, not even close."
A 22 percent across-the-board cut to community programs that receive city funding, including AIDS organizations, still stands in the proposed budget.
AIDS advocates applauded the mayor for rejecting the proposed cuts. However, some said the city needs to actually invest even more money because the federal government is slashing AIDS funding while number of city residents with HIV/AIDS increases.
05/28/08
CALIFORNIA: AIDS Funding Spared
Source: San Francisco Chronicle:: Heather Knight; Courtesy of the CDC National Center for HIV, STD, and TB Prevention