The advocacy group 50 Ways Rockbridge met Tuesday evening to discuss ways to protect abortion rights. WMRA's Randi B. Hagi reports.
About 25 attendees clustered into the basement of Grace Episcopal Church in Lexington to hear panelists discuss abortion from legal, medical, personal, and political perspectives.
Domnica Radulescu, a professor at Washington and Lee University, contrasted her experiences here in the States with growing up in Communist Romania – where she knew women who died or were seriously injured by back alley abortions.
DOMNICA RADULESCU: Women who have had abortions: we need to tell our stories and to not be ashamed. And my abortion, unlike my mother's, was legal, and it was in a clinic near Charlottesville, and safe, and it was not traumatic.
Marilyn Alexander, vice-mayor of Lexington, told WMRA that the potential fall of Roe v. Wade raises the stakes for local and state elections.
MARILYN ALEXANDER: If this becomes something that's going to be handed down state-by-state, it's going to be very important who you elect to local office and regional offices, because they will be making serious decisions about our rights.
Sydney Bufkin came to represent the nonprofit Blue Ridge Abortion Fund, which helps Virginia residents and those traveling to Virginia pay for abortions and 'practical support.'
SYDNEY BUFKIN: So for instance if somebody needs transportation… we can help pay for that. If they need housing, because they need to stay overnight, or if they need childcare, we can provide funding for those as well.
She said they have a weekly budget of $13,000, and they often run out of that money by the end of the day each Monday.
