Donations Save FL Abortion Clinic

From the Guardian:

Just a few weeks ago, one of the few abortion clinics left in Orlando, Florida, looked like it would have to close its doors. A government agency had ordered it to pay $193,000 in fines – enough to potentially bankrupt the clinic.

But supporters of the clinic, the Center of Orlando for Women, had an idea: they would crowdfund the money to keep it open. Within days, they succeeded.

As of Friday, the fundraiser had amassed more than $199,000 from roughly 5,500 donors. Many of the donations were less than $50.

“I’ll never forget how those protesters traumatized me as a scared teen making the hardest decision of my life,” wrote one donor who gave $5. “I one day hope to go back there and support women the way you do.”

Had the Center of Orlando for Women gone dark, abortion patients across the south would have been affected. Because Florida is one of the few southern states that still permits abortion, it saw a greater surge in patients seeking the procedure than any other state in the country after Roe v Wade collapsed last year, according to researchers from the Society of Family Planning.

Read more here.