About every third woman and each fourth man will experience domestic violence over the course of their lives. Because domestic violence can escalate to serious injury or murder, survivors must take steps to extend their safety—even perhaps by fleeing their home.
Of the full homicides that occurred within the U.S. in 2020, 34% were women and 6% were men murdered by their intimate partners.
Research has clearly shown the connection between domestic violence and homelessness. For example, a California study found that this was the case for survivors of domestic violence they’re 4 times more more likely to experience housing instability in comparison with those that had not experienced domestic violence.
We are two Psychologists based in Washington DC, who study the experiences, fights And Strengthen of survivors of domestic violence.
In Washington, one in 4 homeless people report a history of domestic violence, with nearly half reporting it direct reason for his or her homelessness.
Domestic violence and housing instability
Housing instability brings its own set of problems for survivors, including poor health, economic uncertainty and that Risk of future violence. These stresses may cause survivors to relapse into abusive relationships or other unsafe living situations.
Knowing the vicious cycle between domestic violence and housing instability, domestic violence experts advocate for interventions that provide rapid, specialized assistance to survivors in search of help Emergency aid for housing construction.
However, all too often these measures fail. Our 2018-2019 study of domestic violence survivors in the town's homeless services found that out of 41 participants only 4 received immediate accommodationeither with a bed in a shelter or a hotel.
We work with domestic violence advocates and advocates as members of the Action Research Collective Against Domestic Violencea project of DC Coalition Against Domestic Violence. This group collectively decides research questions through discussions about what hinders community practitioners' ability to support survivors of domestic violence.
Domestic violence advocates and advocates in our group alerted us to repeated reports of how the county's homeless services system was failing survivors. The group designed a study to seek out out why.
Survivors' access to homeless services
From May 2018 to May 2019, our team recruited study participants within the waiting room of the Virginia Williams Family Resource Centerthe gateway for families in need of emergency shelter in Washington.
Of the 779 clients we studied, 183 responded that domestic violence was the rationale for his or her housing instability; 41 of them agreed to interviews about their experiences accessing homeless services.
A Washington law states that survivors of domestic violence don’t have to prove residency within the county to be eligible for homeless assistance. The guidelines also stipulate that survivors ought to be asked inquiries to sensitively assess their circumstances and that they need to meet with a neighborhood domestic violence shelter coordinator to attach them with resources.
Instead of receiving this specialized support, a lot of our participants reported that they found the intake process confusing and unpredictable. Nearly half said they waited greater than three hours to satisfy with employees, sometimes only to seek out out they needed different information to prove eligibility and would have to start out the method again one other day.
Participants told us they were hesitant to share their experiences of domestic violence with staff and described inconsistent responses after they did. Of the 20 participants who reported experiencing domestic violence during their admission, only 11 reported being interviewed by staff about their experiences and only two met with the power's domestic violence specialist. Several participants reported that after they disclosed experiences of domestic violence, staff simply moved on without asking for further details.
The lack of assist in response to the exposure of domestic violence left many participants distressed. One participant described it this fashion: “I felt discouraged and ashamed because I told all these people that I didn't know my business, only for them to say it wasn't good enough.”
The conversation derived from the Domestic Violence Action Research Collective, CC BY-ND
The Impact of Homeless Services on Survivors
Many participants felt that staff ignored their safety concerns, particularly when staff insisted that survivors stick with friends, family or their abusive partner moderately than seek public resources. Participants said that staff sometimes even contacted these individuals without the survivors knowing.
Only 22 of our 41 participants were eligible for the advantages. Four got shelter immediately. Eighteen participants received referrals to public or private sources of housing assistance, or each, but too often these resources were dead ends. Participants were placed on long waiting lists, landlords didn’t accept vouchers, or referral options didn’t meet participants' immediate needs.
For example, “rapid rehousing” is commonly referred to – a program that gives government rent subsidies for as much as a 12 months, after which individuals need to pay their very own rent. Survivors eligible for rapid rehousing must find reasonably priced housing within the county, which represents a major barrier to this system's effectiveness.
As one survivor put it: “Where can I rent if it's not in a slumlord or not in certain dangerous areas?” I'm in search of safety. Getting to safety doesn’t mean I’m attempting to get into danger.”
The 19 survivors who were ineligible for advantages got quite a lot of reasons, often including an inability to prove they were homeless. Ten participants told us that they and their children had nowhere to go after they left Virginia Williams. Leaving without help brought difficult decisions, including maxing out bank cards for hotel stays or begging to stick with family and friends in conditions that created latest problems.
Some of the people we interviewed believed that the denial of support was as a consequence of racist and classist stereotypes of black women wanting to “take advantage of the system.” Given that 39 of the 41 participants on this study were Black, as were the vast majority of the middle's clientele, we consider the chance that racial bias can have influenced the frequent denial of services is important.
Underserved Survivors of Domestic Violence
If we focus only on the interaction between staff and participants, the best interpretation of those results could be that staff are uninformed, uncaring, or each. Or one might wonder if there’s something improper with survivors who seek help—that they’re being turned away because they don't take the correct steps to get help.
We consider these interpretations miss the larger context: In our assessment, these interactions are the predictable results of service providers and survivors attempting to operate in a dysfunctional system in a context where little or no housing support is accessible to the community .
The need for housing programs in our region far exceeds capability. This pushes survivors who lack resources into an unaffordable rental market, triggering a series of cascading problems. The impact falls disproportionately on communities that already face structural and interpersonal discrimination, comparable to the Black women in our study.
Our study shows that this results in a more focused system Determination of eligibility as determination of need and restrict spending moderately than improving the protection of survivors because staff are within the unenviable position of providing inadequate assistance to many desperate people.
These interactions leave many without good options. One of the participants we interviewed summed up her experience this fashion: “I was upset. I was discouraged. And it just left me thinking, Well, maybe I'm not in so much danger. Maybe I can just hold on for a bit longer and try not to upset him or anything. I just tried to do the best I could with it.”
image credit : theconversation.com