Virginia Planned Parenthood Flush With Cash, Abortion Regs Are Needed 
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by Victoria Cobb
June 22, 2007
LifeNews.com Note: Victoria Cobb is the president of the Family Foundation, a pro-life groups based in Virginia.
According to Planned Parenthood of Virginia, 18 of their 19 abortion clinics would have to close if the Virginia General Assembly passes one of The Family Foundation’s priority legislative initiatives — abortion clinic safety regulations — because the cost would be unbearable.
According to its own financial reports, however, that doesn’t appear to be the case.
For the fiscal year July 1, 2005 – June 30, 2006 Planned Parenthood Federation of America (PPFA) recorded donations of $212.2 million, clinic revenue of $345.1 million, taxpayer funding of $305.3 million and a net profit of $55.8 million.
You read that correctly. Not only did the non-profit organization end with a profit of over $50 million, taxpayers in our nation, including you, have been forced to give the nation’s largest abortion provider over $305 million of your hard earned dollars in just the past year. In fact, over one-third of Planned Parenthood’s income is from government (taxpayer) grants.
During the same fiscal year, Planned Parenthood performed 264,943 abortions and provided 1,245,506 "emergency contraception kits." For the first time, the annual report does not include the number of adoption referrals given by Planned Parenthood. In its previous report, abortions outnumbered adoption referrals 138-1. One can imagine that number only grew worse.
The organization also spent nearly $50 million on lobbying efforts, raising the question of whether taxpayer dollars are used to supplement lobbying efforts to get even more taxpayer dollars, and to promote abortion through public policy.
In addition, we have learned that Planned Parenthood affiliates are working hard to infiltrate churches, particularly in urban areas, with their pro-abortion message, by offering "education" and "health" services. It is our understanding that several churches in Richmond have partnered with Planned Parenthood to offer these services.
Clearly flush with cash, Planned Parenthood can spend a little bit of their profit to improve the minimal safety standards in their clinics. The excuse that keeping women safe is too expensive is insulting to the intelligence of anyone who can read a financial statement. Legislators who use this argument as cover for voting against this commonsense legislation are either severely misinformed or outright deceitful.
It is time that the General Assembly of Virginia passes not only legislation that requires these clinics to improve their safety standards, but also cuts off the free flow of taxpayer dollars to this extreme group.
Candidates for seats in both the House of Delegates and Senate must make it clear whether they support these reasonable measures. I hope that you will contact the candidates in your district and ask them where they stand on these important issues.
