Northern Virginia Bureau Chief Julie Carey reports on the initiative that provides free transportation to women seeking abortions.
Abortion rights advocates say transportation and its cost can be a big barrier. In Virginia, an initiative launched last year is helping women get to appointments free of charge. Demand is expected to soar after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade.
The passenger seats of Ammie Pascua’s car are empty as she recently rolled along the streets of Norfolk. But on other days, Pascua carries a passenger, picking them up, driving them to a clinic for an abortion appointment and delivering them back home. It’s a process that can take anywhere from two hours to nearly all day.
“Some of these people, their families don’t know where they’re going. Some people don’t have the support all around that would be ideal,” she said.
The initiative is called Practi-Cab and was started by the group REPRO Rising Virginia. It partners with organizations that help women pay for abortion care. When a woman also lacks transportation, a Practi-Cab volunteer can step in.
“There’s a lot of folks in our state that don’t live in counties where there’s actual clinics. I think its over 92% of folks that live in counties in the state of Virginia where there’s not a clinic available,” Michelle Wooten-McFarland of REPRO Rising Virginia said.
Pascua, a mother of two boys, is on the board of a newly formed abortion fund in Hampton Roads. Personal experience inspired her to get involved; a Richmond-area fund helped pay for her abortion in 2019.
“When I found out about the fund in Richmond, it changed my life. It was a huge relief,” she said.
She found more than financial support.
“They just talked to me like a whole human being that was making the right choice for their body,” Pascua said. “I was just overwhelmed with just the compassion that was coming from complete strangers.”
Now she provides emotional support along with the ride. The Practi-Cab volunteers get special training as abortion doulas. It consists of informational and emotional support, Wooten-McFarland said.
“We definitely know the procedure, we know the medication, proper terms, stuff like that, so we can answer basic-level, service-level questions,” she said.
Practi-Cab volunteers do not drive into other states to transport women seeking abortion, but if women make their way to the state, volunteers will pick them up from Virginia airports and hotel rooms.
Practi-Cab volunteer teams are operating in four regions of Virginia, with a fifth on the way. In Northern Virginia, some are already picking up women who are flying in from Texas and taking them to a clinic in Alexandria.
Since the Dobbs decision overturned Roe, demand is growing, and so is the number of people stepping forward to volunteer. REPRO Rising Virginia is working to train 56 new volunteers and another cohort next.
“We have over 200 people who signed up after the decision dropped, so we’re going to start onboarding those folks as well,” Wooten-McFarland said.
In Hampton Roads, volunteers feel the urgency, Pascua said.
“It’s a tsunami of energy that we’re trying to manage the best we can,” she said.
Pascua said she’s hoping to recast how some view abortion.
“It’s not a terrible, awful thing to have an abortion,” she said. “So, normalizing abortion as essential health care is — after funding abortions and providing access — number one to us.”
Hampton Roads volunteers give women specially decorated care bags on the ride home. Pascua said she includes cozy socks, snacks and what she called an affirmation note.
“Love your body. You are strong. Trust you can make decisions and be unaffected by the judgment of others,” she wrote.
