[Congressional Record Volume 150, Number 69 (Monday, May 17, 2004)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E876-E877]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                        TRIBUTE TO BONNIE GAINER

                                 ______
                                 

                          HON. BERNARD SANDERS

                               of vermont

                    in the house of representatives

                          Monday, May 17, 2004

  Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Speaker, I want to recognize today a woman who is, 
at one and the same time, exceptional and representative. Bonnie Gainer 
has served with great dedication as director of the Rutland County 
Women's Network. Originally the Battered Women's Shelter, this 
organization has been a mainstay for women who seek counsel, help, and 
often a safe haven, from abusive relationships.
  Bonnie Gainer is exceptional in both the depth of her commitment to 
women in need, and her ability to organize both staff and community so 
that those women can find the support and assistance that they all too 
often desperately require. But in another sense, she is representative: 
all across Rutland, all across Vermont, all across this nation, women 
respond and have been responding to the inhospitable condition in which 
too many of their sisters live.
  Physical and mental abuse is, tragically, widespread in America. It 
is not limited to women, of course, but with Greater frequency than 
most can imagine wives, girlfriends and daughters find themselves 
trapped in difficult

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and dangerous relationships. It is both a point of pride--in the good 
work they do--and despair--that the number is so large--that I report 
that the Women's Network has sheltered women in Rutland for 1087 bed-
nights in the past three months alone.
  For a decade and a half Bonnie Gainer has led the effort to provide a 
haven and an alternative to women who are abused. She has been a 
bulwark in the community, a truly essential resource for hundreds and 
hundreds of women. She is a remarkable woman, and I salute her, and the 
many, many other women who support each other in times of desperate 
need.

                          ____________________