Facility being sought for homeless women and children

More women and children are finding themselves on the streets and seeking help from the Barbados Alliance to End Homelessness (BAEH).

Concerned about this, the charity’s president Kemar Saffrey said he is engaged in talks to facilitate a shelter specifically for homeless women and children.

“We collect data every single day on persons coming to this organisation and we are seeing a lot more women and children coming to us, and this is because Barbados really only ever had a shelter for battered women and not necessarily any other place that women could go unless they were in a domestic abuse situation,” he said on Thursday.

“So women that are pregnant or with very young children come. We’ve had cases where mothers are here with up to five children at one time. We need to address this a little bit more. I do believe as well that there needs to be a shelter for women and children in Barbados at this point and I’m in talks with some persons to facilitate having a shelter for women who are not in domestic abuse situations and their children,” Saffrey added, though not providing any details about the other parties or the details of their discussions.

He spoke to the media about his concern and effort during the launch of the iPLEDGE II campaign, a fundraising effort to raise $1 million to purchase the building which houses the BAEH’s offices and its 90-bed shelter.

Saffrey said while the shelter can provide a place for mothers and their offspring to rest their heads, it does not have specific facilities for young children.

“The issue is that the children need recreational space. When they are in our facilities, they need to be able to have sessions, they need to be able to have some sort of schooling because in some cases they cannot go to school because of the homelessness situation,” he said.

“From my research and my experience travelling all over the world and understanding homelessness, children need much more than just a building that they could just come into and sit down, as they’re obviously going to be restless. So there are a number of components that we have to look at with the women and children.”

For now, Saffrey said the BAEH will continue to work with its partners to counsel these individuals to find out how best to get them off the streets and back into a home or with relatives. (JB)