Extra patients might have to go to Gallia or Fairfield counties.
When victims of domestic abuse are attempting to escape an abusive partner’s control in Athens County, their options are limited to staying in a friend or family member’s home where they might be discovered, or a nondescript, confidential four-bedroom home hidden in the county.
My Sister’s Place, a domestic violence shelter and one of the few refuges in Southeast Ohio for battered women, men and their children, has become a part-time home for many in that situation. Those who make it to the shelter stay an average of 49 days, said Kelly Cooke, executive director of My Sister’s Place.
But in recent years, My Sister’s Place has had to turn away victims, sending them to either a nearby shelter in Gallipolis or Lancaster, or back to the homes they escaped.
The 317 Board, which serves Athens, Hocking and Vinton Counties in programs related to alcohol, drug addiction and mental health services, stated that My Sister’s Place received 4,770 hotline calls in 2013 from 3,279 individuals, a 36 percent increase from 2012. Of those individuals, 73 received an accumulation of 2,595 “bed nights,” or days spent in the 10-bed shelter.
The shelter turned away 79 adults and 120 children because it was at full capacity.
“A couple years ago we had four babies, and they were all in cribs, and that was four bed spaces,” Cooke said. “When people call the hotline and we don’t have enough beds, we spend time trying to locate beds in our region where they can stay.”
Cooke said the shelter requests that the victim of domestic violence call back every day until a solution is reached. Often, Athens, Hocking and Vinton County women are sent to The Lighthouse Domestic Abuse Center in Lancaster — a more than 40-mile drive from Athens County — or the Serenity House in Gallia County, which also serves Jackson and Meigs County.
Cooke said there have been situations when all local shelters have been at full capacity.
“Sometimes, people have to stay home because of that,” she said.
Athens County saw a total of 154 domestic violence incident reports in 2012, according to a report by the Ohio Attorney General’s Office.
In 2014, Cooke said her shelter received approximately 4,700 hotline calls and 2,800 bed nights, though she couldn’t say by press time how many were turned away that year.
Many have prolonged stays at the shelter because they can’t afford alternative housing and lack the work experience needed to find a job to finance life after abuse, Cooke said.
In some cases, the victim will receive a voucher for housing that can be used to subsidize rent so he or she can leave the shelter.
The shelter needs more housing vouchers to open up bed space; expanding the facility isn’t an option with the shelter’s roughly $216,000 budget from the 317 Board, not including grant and Medicaid funding.
“There’s usually always a waiting list for vouchers for clients,” Earl Cecil, executive director of the 317 Board, said. “They do a good job prioritizing people who are clients of the board, but there’s not sufficient vouchers to cover everybody.”
Athens Metropolitan Housing Authority receives a set amount of vouchers from the U.S. department of Housing and Urban Development, Erica Flanders, coordinator for property management and administration at Athens’ MHA, said.
Athens has received 698 Housing Choice vouchers, which provides housing to low- income families.
The area also receives housing vouchers for more defined demographics that domestic abuse victims could qualify for, including 100 for non-elderly disabled persons and 33 Shelter Plus Care tenant rentals, for persons who are homeless and disabled.
Several Shelter Plus Care vouchers have been issued to those at MSP, Flanders said.
Flanders said the MHA only took about 42 of those who qualified off the waiting list in 2014, though about 21 vouchers were issued.
“We’d need more money,” Flanders said. “Any time that we have the opportunity to apply for more vouchers, we do apply to bring more vouchers into the area.”
When the MHA has the capability to issue a certain amount of vouchers, Flanders said they pull dozens more off the waiting list. Those who respond to MHA’s inquiries will receive a voucher application and are asked for a sit-down interview with the MHA.
Theresa Corral, an administrative assistant at The Lighthouse, said her shelter has 18 beds but still sees an immense need for housing assistance vouchers.
“It’s hard to focus on everything else when you don’t know where you’re going to be living in a week,” Corral said.
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