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Northampton: Safe Passage To Close Emergency DV Shelter After 46 Years
COMMUNITY
Safe Passage To Close Emergency DV Shelter After 46 Years
The nonprofit has yet to offer specifics about new priorities after the closure.
By Dusty Christensen | Published 1 hour ago
NORTHAMPTON — The local nonprofit Safe Passage, which works with survivors of domestic violence and relationship abuse, has announced that it is closing its emergency shelter program.
Open since 1977, the congregate shelter has provided refuge for those fleeing violence and in need of a temporary place to stay. However, Safe Passage Executive Director Marianne Winters said that as the local housing shortage has grown more severe, the length of stay for clients has soared from around several months when the shelter first opened to more than a year in recent times. Some have stayed for as long as three years, she said.
“It takes a lot longer to assist them to find permanent housing and in conditions that are unacceptable for anything but a brief stay,” Winters told The Shoestring in a phone interview Monday. She added that the organization will continue to budget assistance for helping those in immediate need of an emergency safe place. “We will always plan for the temporary hotel stay … for someone whose life is in danger and has to escape tonight.”
The Northampton shelter, whose location is undisclosed to protect those living there, had become part of a network of such shelters available to survivors across the state. That meant that it was less likely that a Hampshire County resident would be able to use one of the six rooms in the shelter, Winters said. The state’s Department of Public Health had been paying for those rooms, meaning Safe Passage will lose that funding when the shelter program closes by July 1. ... The Department of Public Health “will go back out to the network to fund those,” Winters said. “There’s a net loss across the state of zero.”
{snip}
Safe Passage To Close Emergency DV Shelter After 46 Years
The nonprofit has yet to offer specifics about new priorities after the closure.
By Dusty Christensen | Published 1 hour ago
NORTHAMPTON — The local nonprofit Safe Passage, which works with survivors of domestic violence and relationship abuse, has announced that it is closing its emergency shelter program.
Open since 1977, the congregate shelter has provided refuge for those fleeing violence and in need of a temporary place to stay. However, Safe Passage Executive Director Marianne Winters said that as the local housing shortage has grown more severe, the length of stay for clients has soared from around several months when the shelter first opened to more than a year in recent times. Some have stayed for as long as three years, she said.
“It takes a lot longer to assist them to find permanent housing and in conditions that are unacceptable for anything but a brief stay,” Winters told The Shoestring in a phone interview Monday. She added that the organization will continue to budget assistance for helping those in immediate need of an emergency safe place. “We will always plan for the temporary hotel stay … for someone whose life is in danger and has to escape tonight.”
The Northampton shelter, whose location is undisclosed to protect those living there, had become part of a network of such shelters available to survivors across the state. That meant that it was less likely that a Hampshire County resident would be able to use one of the six rooms in the shelter, Winters said. The state’s Department of Public Health had been paying for those rooms, meaning Safe Passage will lose that funding when the shelter program closes by July 1. ... The Department of Public Health “will go back out to the network to fund those,” Winters said. “There’s a net loss across the state of zero.”
{snip}