Where We've Been and Who We Are

The Women's Center of Wake County, Inc. started over twenty years ago as a grass roots movement to meet the needs of women re-entering the community from prison. Over the course of those 25+ years, the Center has responded to the changing needs of women, expanding and providing services as indicated by the women in our community. Over the last 12 years, the Center has shifted focus in response to the most critical needs of women, addressing the growing issue of homelessness for women with children and single women . The Board, staff and direct service volunteers have become strong advocates and service providers for those who are homeless or at-risk of becoming homeless.

Beginning with a day room for women who were homeless and in need of respite in 1993, the Center now serves as one of only two Day Shelters in Raleigh, and the only one for women and children who are homeless.

In addition, the Center has re-engineered and restructured its programs and services in response to the growing needs and producing results of increasing self-reliance. The expansion into transitional and permanent housing with supportive services was the next logical step in fulfilling the mission of empowerment for women and their families. In 2000, the Center opened Epiphany House, a communal living environment for single women in a beautiful two-story home in Raleigh. 2003 and 2004 brought more growth as the Women's Center purchased two single-family homes which we rent to low-income, single moms.

The Center's Staff

The current staff of ten at the Women's Center have a combined 94 years of experience working in human services, over 60 of those years working with women who have low incomes or are homeless. The Executive Director has a Ph. D. in Counselor Education, three staff have Masters degrees and three have Bachelors degrees. Four of the staff have been homeless and two have experienced incarceration at some point in their lives. With this combined education, professional and life experience, the staff are a group of strong women who both understand the needs of the families with whom we work and provide role models showing that barriers can be overcome with positive results.

The Need for Services

Between 1990 and 1998, the fastest growing population of homeless were women with children who also had severe and persistent mental health issues. Since 1996, the complexity of issues that clients (coming to the Women's Center) are dealing with in addition to their homelessness has increased significantly. Issues range from childhood abuse to domestic violence. Ninety percent (90%) of all homeless women suffer from post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). More than 80% (300 individuals) of the homeless clients at the Women's Center have been identified as having persistent mental health issues. These issues prevent clients from being able to fully communicate their needs or to develop the skills necessary to fully access the resources available to them. We believe that part of the problem with this methodology is that it focuses on the client's weaknesses and skill deficits. By doing so, the client is never able to identify her strengths and is never able to build upon those strengths as a tool with which she can increase her life skills.

The Women's Center's Approach to Helping

The Women's Center has developed a new and innovative approach to helping clients in which the client's identified strengths become the focus of the intervention. Advocates work with the clients through a five-step process.

The five-step process includes:

address the identification and enhancement of client's strengths
identify a plan of action consistent with the client's priorities and needs capitalizing on her strengths
address the identification and enhancement of the client's formal and informal support systems
address internal, social and institutional barriers to accessing needed resources
address client's needs related to trauma recovery

This strength-based model of advocacy provides services and supports in a manner that is comprehensive and continuous in that it:

addresses basic needs
assists in securing housing
addresses safety needs
identifies and addresses mental health, substance abuse and trauma
builds on natural support systems
builds on strengths
is flexible
is tailored to each woman's needs and preferences
is culturally sensitive
includes goal-setting
supports her role as caretaker, provider and parent
assesses and addresses the children's needs
recognizes family as the focus of treatment
offers support groups for moms and children
has small caseloads which are critical to improved outcomes
provides a caseworker iwho s available 24/7

Outcomes and Results of the Center's Approach

The short-term outcome (which is immediate in nature) is outreach and engagement on the part of the client. The intermediate outcomes include:

participation in treatment, support and training programs
movement to safer and/or more stable housing
decreased substance abuse
decreased psychological distress
increased resources

The long-term project outcomes for clients include:

increased housing stability
improved mental health functioning
reduced drug and alcohol use
increased trauma recovery
improved functioning as parent
family reunification/preservation
improved physical health
decreased involvement with the criminal justice system
employment
decreased PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder)