Women’s Shelter and Food Bank Usage Serious Issues for Our Region

In Alberta, food bank usage in 2015 was up 23-per cent when compared to the numbers from 2014. That was the biggest jump in Canada, with the national food bank usage climbing just 1.3-per cent.

The numbers were also very concerning when looking at women’s emergency shelters in our region. Harbour House in Lethbridge had to turn away 1,949 women and children in 2015, up from 1,218 in 2014. The Safe Haven Women’s Shelter in Taber noted an increase as well, having to turn away 191 women and children last year, compared to 159 from the year before.

“Last year we saw 97 women turned away and 94 children, which seems to be a steady increase for us,” stated Safe Haven Executive Director, Amy Hall. “As a rural community we often see women and children coming in from bigger city centres that are having even larger numbers of turnaways.

“We do everything that we can not to say no and just close the door,” Hall continued. “We offer different resources and we try to set up with hotel partnerships if we can, and we try to really resource out to the most effective service to meet their need instead of just saying no. We always pride ourselves on saying, ‘No, but here’s another option that we can provide.’”

Hall noted that for smaller communities like Taber, transportation is another major problem.

“When you get into extremely rural and even northern communities, you’re looking at big challenges around isolation, around transportation and that’s probably one of the bigger issues that we see, is transportation as a barrier that could keep a woman or a child in an unsafe situation,” said Hall.

This was the fourth year for the Vital Signs report, which is one of 32 released across the country from various Community Foundations.

by Patrick Burles - @Patrick Burles on Twitter

Women’s Shelter and Food Bank Usage Serious Issues for Our Region

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