Women’s Center

The Women’s Center is a place where women gather to enjoy many activities, such as crafts, educational programs, and cultural activities in the outside community.

The Women’s Center is a place of safety where we can all come and enjoy each other’s company in a supportive environment and not feel so alone.

The Women’s Center is a caring and loving place where we are not judged, but are accepted just as we are.

         ~ Mission statement created by members in 2002

The Women’s Center is a drop-in homelessness prevention program for women who are current or former shelter guests or residents of Abby’s House. The program combines educational and social activities that enhance the health and reduce the isolation of women living in poverty. In addition, advocacy services are provided to address specific concerns, connecting women with a wide variety of vital community resources. The Women’s Center serves over one hundred women annually.

Women’s Center staff and volunteers consistently affirm the humanity of women who are most often marginalized and invisible in our society. Women’s Center members are seen, their voices are heard and, together, their spirits are healed.

The community aspect of the Center is eloquently captured in the following poem, written by a Women’s Center member who is also a former emergency shelter guest:

Reading Poetry at the Women’s Center

crinkle of light reflects
the sound of women laughing
the sound of a poem being read

pink walls
a chair scoots back –
we speak, we talk, we are

Darleen Gadt, from her book, Weaving,
privately published in 2003