Good News: Florida Uses Federal Funds for Abstinence Education (740 hits)
by Karla Dial
(August 17, 2011) Thirteen abstinence education groups in the Sunshine State will soon see their bottom lines get a boost, thanks to the federal government. Though the Democrats controlling Congress refused to pass a bill reauthorizing Title V — the 15-year-old block grant to states to provide abstinence education — advocates successfully lobbied them to include it as a rider on the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act in 2009. Through the new Title V, Florida will receive $2.5 million a year through 2014; the Florida Department of Health plans to distribute the money through 13 grants of $150,000 a piece.
And Florida abstinence educators need the money, said Mary Anne Mosack, director of state initiatives at the National Abstinence Education Association. Last year, a state government official declared that only four s*x-education curricula could be used—three of which were comprehensive, and the abstinence program listed was unavailable. “When abstinence educators complained, they were told just to modify the curricula — while the state paid the comprehensive s*x-ed groups,” she said. Changing that edict will be the next step, Mosack said; with 22 true abstinence education curricula available, educators shouldn’t have to modify comprehensive s*x ed materials for their audiences.
