By the end of June, those who rely on the YWCA of Manchester’s Brook Street Women's Shelter will have to turn elsewhere for housing or find other help transitioning out of homelessness.
As of this week, the YWCA staff says 16 women were staying overnight at the shelter. Around 25 others rely on it for other kinds of support, such as counseling, to help them transition to new jobs, housing, and addiction treatment programs. It’s not atypical for the shelter to have 20 women on the waiting list each night.
The shelter opened in February as an emergency response to the city’s growing homelessness crisis. Manchester provided the YWCA with enough money to keep its doors open until mid-year, but the organization says they need $550,000 to continue their work for another year.
Mayor Joyce Craig announced last week that the city is allocating $100,000 toward the shelter in its fiscal year 2024 budget. However, YWCA staff say other necessary funding from private donors and government sources, such as the American Rescue Plan Act, has not materialized.
“Unfortunately, this closure coincides with the start of the next fiscal year, and a lot of those funding sources were overstretched and already out of funds,” said Katie Parent, director of programs and community outreach at YWCA.
The city has put out a formal request for proposals, encouraging other nonprofits to come forward and save the shelter.
One of the women who could be forced to leave the shelter is Tammy Chambers, who has been sleeping there for three months. She appreciates the safe and supportive environment the shelter provides.
“It’s probably one of the best experiences I’ve ever gone through,” she said.
Although the YWCA is helping her connect with housing, she fears she would have to go back to paying $300 a week for a room in a sober living facility.
Chambers said the shelter has given her health assistance, job guidance and an extra layer of safety. She regrets that residents will lose programming that encourages women-to-women support.
“Everybody looks at us, like, ‘Women, we have it!’” she said. “And it turns out we don’t have it. Women supporting other women is important.”
Chambers said she and her husband lost their apartment during the pandemic after her husband lost his carpentry job, and they couldn’t afford to pay rent. Ever since, they have been struggling to find shelter. She said if she doesn’t find a sober living facility soon, she will be forced to sleep in a tent under a bridge where her husband lives.
Still, she said, they prefer that rather than going to the Families in Transition shelter, where “there is too much drama” and it is usually at capacity.
Chambers also worries that the Beech Street Shelter, another option the city opened as an emergency winter protection, is also at capacity every night. According to staff at that shelter, there are usually about 25 people on the waiting list.
The city announced last week that they will transform the Beech Street Shelter into a day engagement center with 40 beds and other resources for unhoused people. Chambers and others say they will make use of its services.
After 16 weeks of operating and serving 40 women, at least 12 women in the Brook Street Women’s Shelter have connected with addiction programs, 10 have found full-time jobs, 4 have permanent housing, and 4 current residents are in the process of qualifying for YWCA rental assistance, according to Manchester Ink Link.
Katie Parent at the YWCA said those numbers show that the shelter is making a difference in the lives of unhoused women in Manchester, but she emphasized that the closure would not affect their other programs and services, especially those for survivors of domestic violence.
“Many of [the women] are planting in our garden and doing yard work outside the house, [...] That gives them a sense of being useful,” she said.
Parent said there’s a need for a women-only shelter because many unhoused residents have had bad experiences or even been victimized at co-ed shelters. She said the closure will also affect the staff receiving a “livable wage.”
“Many [of the residents] have said that it feels more like a home than a shelter,” she said.
Parent said the city has been making an effort to find more permanent solutions for homelessness instead of opening emergency shelters each winter; this closure is a setback.
The YWCA has started compiling lists of other service providers in and out of Manchester. They are looking for organizations that can provide permanent or transitional housing, sober living treatment facilities, or other types of shelters. Parent said the YWCA will continue offering crisis services to the unhoused population.
“I think the housing crisis isn't going away,” she said. “The number of folks experiencing homelessness isn't going to reduce magically. So, we have to come up with a sustainable solution, moving away from just fatality prevention.”
