Women's Health Clinic Closes

"We haven't been able to make our rent payments," said Linci Comy, Women's Choice Clinic's executive director, who has been with the nonprofit since 1977. "We've been waiting for the checks from Medi-Cal and they're not forthcoming. To balance the state budget, California has frozen payments for services already provided, and for us, that is a fatal decision. With that and issues of the economy, it all came down on us in March. Our landlord let us know we have to be out in a couple of weeks. We're looking at bankruptcy.

"It's just devastating, and really serves as a wake-up call," she said. "Can the community of Oakland really meet the needs of health care here? If you're on state funding, you deserve quality care. But where are you going to go?"

The clinic, which has been on 14th Street across from the federal buildings the past six years, opened in 1972 as an independent feminist women's clinic with a mission to provide quality, affordable reproductive health care.

"A feminist clinic means it's woman-centered care with the idea of informed consent, putting women in
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charge of their reproductive health functions," Comy said. "It's a philosophy about quality of care, education and respect. You can't make good decisions without the information."

In its more than three decades, the clinic served more than 64,000 clients and had been seeing about 2,000 clients a year.

"Women's Choice Clinic was a safe haven for underserved women, a place where women knew they would receive health care with dignity," said Destiny Lopez, executive director of ACCESS, which connects poor women around California to reproductive health information and services. "This is truly a sad day for Oakland. We are losing an independent community clinic that made comprehensive reproductive health services available to all women."

The Women's Choice Clinic has been known for its work with teens, and the lesbian, gay and transgender communities, as well as with clients for whom English is a second language. The clinic has also been known for accepting women on state aid or who didn't have insurance to cover medical treatment, Comy said.

"More and more women are unable to pay for services," Comy said. "Ten years ago, it used to be that half of our patients were on state funding. Now, it's been 90 percent. That really speaks to the poverty of women."

As a medical center, the clinic is required to maintain health records for seven years. So they'll still need space for storage of records, and an office to maintain records requests. Clinic workers hope someone will come forward with an offer of space.

"We will not be able to provide health services anymore, but we plan to continue to be a presence through community outreach and sex education projects," Comy said. "I'm just not yet sure how or where that will be."

If anyone has office or storage space, or other offers of help, e-mail womenschoiceclinic [at] gmail.com.

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