Safe Passage hopes to break ground on new shelter by end of year

SYCAMORE – Between its shelter and transitional apartments, a DeKalb nonprofit organization housed 169 people in 2023, and with help from recently announced federal funding that number is set to increase, officials revealed Wednesday.

Safe Passage, a domestic violence and sexual assault crisis center in DeKalb County, has acquired a plot of land in the city of DeKalb. Mary Ellen Schaid, the organization’s executive director, said the parcel will be the site of a “better and larger shelter” for the agency during a presentation to the DeKalb County Board Committee of the Whole meting Wednesday.

“We’re working very hard to raise the funds, and we’re hoping to get as much support from the community as we can,” Schaid said. “We’ve gotten some federal dollars from, with the help of our representative, our Congressional representative Lauren Underwood, who’s amazing. So we’re about half way there, we’re going to get there. We’re hoping, really, to break ground by the end of this year.”

Safe Passage was awarded $2.5 million in funding as part of a $12.6 million federal funding package secured with help from U.S. Rep. Lauren Underwood’s office.

The funding was divided up between 14 projects in Illinois’ 14th District that Rep. Underwood, D-Naperville, represents, including $1 million for Hinckley Public Library.

In 2023, Safe Passage housed 94 adults and 45 children in its current DeKalb-based shelter, Schaid said. Also that year, 14 adults and 15 children were housed in apartments in a two-year transitional program with the agency.

Safe Passage provides more services than simple shelter, however. Almost 300 people, including many who were not residents of the shelter or apartment program, received domestic violence counseling services through Safe Passage in 2023, and 96 clients took part in the organization’s sexual assault program, Schaid said.

Safe Passage was founded in DeKalb in 1981. In the decades since, multiple survivors of domestic violence have found refuge in the organization’s services – including some members of the DeKalb County Board.

“I utilized Safe Passage when I was a very young mother in a violent situation, and I’m now an elected official and I have a Master’s [degree]. You guys are awesome, you rock,” said DeKalb County Board member Amber Quitno, a Democrat from District 3.

DeKalb County Board member Rukisha Crawford, a Democrat from District 6, said Quitno wasn’t the only County Board member who’s previously used Safe Passage services.

“I’ve had to use it as well, so thank you for all you do,” Crawford said.

“That’s the thing about it, is that anybody can be a victim of domestic violence, it’s not just poor people, it’s not just people we think, no it’s not like that, it’s anybody and everybody should seek help,” Schaid said.

Schaid said victims of sexual assault and domestic violence often have complex needs, and shelter living isn’t the most robust solution for all who seek services through Safe Passage. To combat that, the agency offers transitional-apartment living, too, where clients can live for up to two years.

Sharing a success story from Safe Passage, Schaid spoke of a Ukranian woman who came to the shelter having suffered abuse. The woman later went on to earn degrees at local higher education institutions and started a successful career.

“She moved out of the apartment, she was a very, very strong success story,” Schaid said. “And she was so successful, that when the war in Ukraine started, when Russia attacked Ukraine, she was able to afford to bring both her parents here, to the United States for their safety.”