The Alberta Council of Women’s Shelters says some rural shelters are scrambling after finding out they’ll be losing funding in just over a month.
The ACWS said the Ministry of Children and Family Services cut funds for over a dozen shelters, most of which serve rural areas.
“We’re seeing this really impact rural communities across the province,” said Cat Champagne with the ACWS.
The ACWS says the change announced earlier this month removes nearly $1 million from shelter budgets.
“We have shelters from High Level to Pincher Creek and we’re seeing the impact straight across the province.”
The move happened quietly during the announcement of a new Emergency Family Violence Services program on May 19 — six weeks before the planned implementation date — which the ACWS said has left many shelters struggling to absorb the cuts without harming clients in crisis.
The new program coming into effect July 1 introduces a change in how the province allocated grants to emergency shelters.
“The Emergency Family Violence Services program establishes a needs-based funding allocation approach which would help address service demand and capacity concerns, define core emergency family violence services and encourage regional collaboration and innovation across the province,” the province’s news release said.
The province said money is meant to go where the need is, so while some shelters are seeing increases, more than a dozen had their one-time funding cut.
The council said while the announcement confirmed a net increase to sector-wide base funding, many of the funding reductions disproportionately affect rural communities.
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According to the ACWS, national research shows regions with smaller populations face the highest rates of gender-based violence, while at the same time having fewer resources for those fleeing a bad situation.
Intimate partner violence rates are 1.8 times higher in rural communities than urban ones and reported violence tend to be more severe, according to Statistics Canada.
“This is probably the most disheartened I’ve ever been, working in shelters,” said Nora-Lee Rear, who has worked at the Camrose shelter for 12 years.
“This is on the backs of the survivors that come to the shelter.”
The Camrose Women’s Shelter has 22 beds and serves up to 450 people a year in and around the rural community south of Edmonton.
“For us, the writing’s been on the wall for quite a few years already — that there was going to be zero investment in actual shelters,” Rear said.
Last week the shelter was told they were being invested in, according to Rear — but the next day, the story changed and the shelter was told $60,000 of their funding was cut.
“We put a lot of concentrated effort into trying to cement good relationships and provide resources in those rural areas, and we wont be able to do that anymore,” Rear said.
The Ministry of Child and Family Services said to support stability, it capped reductions at five per cent and the majority of shelters saw funding increases.
The province is encouraging those concerned about the allocation to explore new funding opportunities.
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