We are very excited to announce that we have received funding from two separate sources to support the development of a service hub for women who have experienced abuse in the City of Kawartha Lakes.
The goal of Bridges of Kawartha Lakes is to reduce barriers to services for women who have experienced abuse and violence by providing them with access to a network of collaborating services. The project will focus on the development of both a physical and virtual ‘one door’, one stop service model, or hub, in which a collaborative of agencies will come together and/or be linked at one location on one day to provide wrap-around, seamless services to victims of intimate partner violence, intimate partner sexual violence and sexual assault.
The Bridges Hub will take a woman-centered approach in a supportive and respectful manner, within each woman’s pace of change. Bridges will have careful, limited information sharing and service providers will work collaboratively and within their individual mandates to best meet the needs of each client. What will make the Bridges Hub unique will be its focus on outreach to women in rural areas. The Hub will establish virtual/satellite sites for women in the more rural parts of the City of Kawartha Lakes to enable them to access the hub services remotely.
Violence Against Women (VAW) service hubs have been in operation in Ontario for the past 15 years. One such hub, START, is located in Peterborough. These hubs have proven to be a highly efficient and effective way to provide services to victims who typically have to navigate a complex service system.
The Bridges of Kawartha Lakes hub concept was introduced in the City of Kawartha-Lakes in the fall of 2015. The concept has since received significant community support from a large number of service providers including the Kawartha-Haliburton Children’s Aid Society, Kawartha Lakes Police Service, OPP, Victim Witness Assistance Program, VCARS, the Ross Memorial Hospital, Women’s Health Care, Kawartha Sexual Assault Centre, Legal Aid, Curve Lake, Women’s Resources and City of Kawartha Lakes Housing.
The Ministry of Community and Social Services will provide funding to the project in the amounts of $30,000 for 2016-17 and an additional $30,000 in 2017-18. The project supports the government’s Sexual Violence and Harassment Action Plan and is aligned to the Ministry’s mandate to provide services and supports for all women and their children fleeing violence. It will also help to mitigate some of the unique challenges being faced in Violence Against Women (VAW) service delivery to those in rural areas.
Funding for the Bridges Hub will also be received from the Trillium Foundation in the form of an eleven month Seed Grant of $69,800.
We hope that Bridges will be operational by the fall of 2016. For more information contact Lori Watson at lwatson@womensresources.ca