DC's Women's Homeless Shelter Feels Impact Of Coronavirus

WASHINGTON, DC — Sherylon Starks struggles with anxiety issues. The coronavirus pandemic worries her a great deal. "This fear of maybe contracting it is just causing a lot hair raising for me at times," she said.

Starks is one of the residents of Calvary Women's Services, which provides transitional and permanent supportive housing and services homeless women. Currently, Calvary houses about 95 women a night at its two transitional housing programs.

"I was homeless, helpless, hopeless, but I came here and the staff here gave me a lot of hope that I can have everything that my heart desires, all my needs met, and so I've been working along those lines," she said.

Starks is a recovering addict who has benefited from the services Calvary offers. She's involved with LEAP group, which exposes residents to different cultural activities to help enrich their lives. She also meditates and practices negotiating strategies to help when she transitions out of Calvary.

"I'm hoping to find housing, because I'm permanently disabled," she said. "Calvary, the staff here, has helped guide me on all the different institutes that can help me get housing, find a volunteer service where I can do volunteer work to still get outside of just being disabled."

Like everyone else in the District, Calvary's residents, volunteers and staff have been impacted by the coronavirus pandemic.

"We have women who are safely here in our transitional and permanent housing programs still getting support, and trying to stay safe," said Calvary CEO Kris Thompson. "We've absolutely seen women who have had jobs losing those jobs. But at the same time are women who've had jobs who have been able to maintain those, at least for the short term."

This lack of mobility for women who are working to put their lives back together can create a great deal of anxiety among the residents.

"For women who come to Calvary who may have experienced violence, and other sort of health and mental health issues, I'm really trying to make sure we're offering support so that women can stay stable and safe during this crisis," Thompson said.

But the coronavirus has also presented both operational and financial challenges for Calvary.

Fewer residents leaving to go to work during the day means more residents on site. That means more resources and staff are needed to provide services. However, while some volunteers are still helping to deliver meals, the restrictions imposed by the the District's stay-home ordermean that no volunteers are coming to the center to work.

"With the loss of volunteers coming on site, we are certainly experiencing the need for more staffing and for the need of all the kinds of extra resources that it takes to keep operating 24-7," Thompson said. "We're estimating our increased costs on a daily basis are about $1,000 more than usual just to be able to provide additional meals, additional supplies, additional staffing."

Like many nonprofit organizations across the District, Calvary is already feeling the financial strain of the coronavirus and Thompson has concerns about the longer term impact on fundraising for her organization.

"At this time we have our big fundraising event in May and we've obviously had to cancel and postpone that too," she said. "So, we will lose about a half a million dollars alone on the loss of that event. So that's a pretty big hit for a nonprofit organization ... We anticipate a potential loss of up to a million dollars in private revenue between now and the end of the calendar year."

Calvary is accepting donations through its website to help it continue providing services for homeless women in need in the District.

According to Chief Development Officer Heather Laing, donations in the following increments can have a huge impact:

• $15 provides a day of meals for one woman
• $30 provides a night of safe housing for one woman
• $100 provides classes for a woman who has lost her job

"The best way to offer support to the women who are living here is to help us keep not just our operations going, but the really solid programming that we do that helps women end their homelessness," Thompson said.

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