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HEALTHY START

Cutting Program Is Ending Hope For Many.

Twenty-five years ago, a distraught young mother left her newborn to die on the lava fields of the Big Island because she felt she had no other option. Since then, concerned members of our West Hawaii communities have joined with others throughout the state to make sure this would never again happen to another baby or mother. In partnership with the state, they created the public health initiative known as Hawaii's Healthy Start Program. For more than 20 years, every family that has given birth in the hospitals of Hawaii has had the opportunity to meet with a Healthy Start representative and to enroll in Healthy Start Home Visiting services -- if they qualified. Last year alone, more than 15,000 children were afforded this safety net at the time of their birth. More than 4,500 children were supported by Healthy Start Home Visitors in communities across the state, with the end result of Hawaii being found one of the safest places in the country to be born.

Because of its success, Hawaii's Healthy Start Program gained international recognition as a model prevention and early intervention program. It has been replicated all across the mainland U.S. under the name Healthy Families America and flourishes in Canada and the Philippines.

Gov. Linda Lingle's choice to eliminate Hawaii's Healthy Start Program threatens not only to extinguish the flame lit by the spirit of that little one who lay abandoned and alone, it also threatens the state's capacity to receive future federal funding designated to support children and families and to prevent child abuse and neglect.

At a cost of less than $500 per baby born each year in Hawaii, we can continue to insure that this tragedy never happens to another child. Our hearts are heavy, knowing the damage that will occur unless this terrible mistake is reversed.

JoAnn Bishop Freed
Kailua-Kona

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Click here to download a Microsoft Word template so that you can take part in this letter writing campaign that will be sent to all governmental representatives in response to Governor Lingle’s announcement of her intention to ELIMINATE funding for the state-wide Healthy Start Program effective July 1, 2009.   It is imperative that all who disagree with this decision raise your voice with ours to make sure we are heard.    Please let us hear from you with a copy of whom you contacted and when you did so we can keep track of the response.