As a survivor of domestic abuse, finding a new place to live — especially with kids or pets — can feel inaccessible.
Many abusers restrict their partner's access to family finances, making it difficult or impossible to leave.
Response, a nonprofit serving survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault in Aspen and the upper Roaring Fork Valley, held a grand opening for its new shelter in Basalt on Feb. 20, inviting community members to tour the facility.
The seven rooms and 24 beds at the Diane and Bruce Halle Center for Hope and Healing will operate as transitional apartments for survivors of abuse who can stay up to two months while looking for more permanent housing.
In addition to food and clothing donations, shared laundry facilities, and a kitchen, each unit is outfitted with its own appliances: a microwave, sink, and small refrigerator.
Staff beamed last week while showing visitors the sleek, new rooms and common areas upstairs, offering food and a Champagne toast in Response’s downstairs offices.
But Shannon Meyer, Response’s executive director, acknowledges that most programs strive to keep their clients’ locations and identities confidential to promote safety, so abusers can’t find or threaten shelter residents.
Before the grand opening, Meyer said this kind of transparency — sharing their shelter's location and details about the building — was not always considered best practice.
“That was one of my sort of mental blocks to being able to do a shelter before this,” Meyer said. “As soon as we pulled a building permit, people would know what we were doing. Our location would be known. It’s a small community.”
Meyer started Response in 2017, offering three nights of emergency shelter in hotels and gradually building a portfolio of rental properties where survivors and their children could have longer stays.
The location of these residences were confidential. In recent years, Response signed more rental agreements and purchased a property, but its four units couldn't accommodate demand.
“It wasn't nearly enough,” Meyer said.
She realized building a shelter was Response’s best chance to help as many people as it could, and recently, she noticed the practice becoming more popular.
A study from 2020 found that “there is no longer a clear connection between a secret and inaccessible shelter location and the safety of survivor-residents.” Some public-facing shelters promoted safety more intentionally, allowing survivors to connect with each other, access child care and social services, and destigmatize their need for support.
To account for Response’s new, public location, Meyer said safety was a top concern during construction.
“We have cameras. We have panic buttons. You can't get in without an access code. The design of it is very secure.”
Despite high-level security measures, Dr. Joanne Belknap, a professor at the University of Colorado Boulder who researches gender-based abuse, is wary of this model.
“I have mixed feelings about it,” Dr. Belknap said on Monday.
Every year, Dr. Belknap analyzes domestic violence fatality data for the Colorado Attorney General’s Office as part of the Domestic Violence Fatality Review Board. Their most recent report shows a disproportionate rate of domestic violence deaths in rural areas, compared to urban centers.
She worries about increased shelter visibility in Basalt.
“The most dangerous time … is when women leave their abusers,” Dr. Belknap said. “So people knowing where the shelter is, it's kind of scary to me.”
Resident perspective
To protect her identity, a survivor of domestic abuse and former resident of Response’s transitional housing is referred to as “Amanda.”
When she moved into one of Response’s apartments, Amanda wasn’t allowed to tell anyone, even friends or family, where she was living. While extremely grateful for this resource, her experience was isolating.
“No one's allowed to come and visit me,” Amanda said. “And this all kind of happened during the holidays, which made it, I think, even more difficult. So, I was really on my own.”
Because Amanda was afraid her former partner would stalk her and find Response’s apartment, she described an underlying, omnipresent fear.
“When I closed the door and if anything were to happen, I was really there by myself. Would anyone know if he came and found me? If he broke in?”
As a result, she sees the benefits of a more visible, communal shelter.
“The idea of having this support system of other women that are going through similar circumstances that you are is very hopeful to me in a building where there are panic buttons and key cards and everyone knows who should be there,” Amanda said.
However, she remains concerned about abusers easily discovering where their former partners are staying.
Despite the risks, Shannon Meyer is confident that Response can keep residents safe in their new shelter, and she hopes this visibility will help chip away at the stigmas surrounding survivors of abuse.
“Here, we're saying there are people in our community who have experienced abuse, and we have built this beautiful place for them to come to stay, and they deserve a beautiful place.
Response received a temporary certificate of occupancy for the Diane and Bruce Halle Center for Hope and Healing on Thursday, Feb. 27.
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