As the Executive Director of Yellow Brick House, Lorris Herenda shared with me her passion for working with the agency and her overall vision and hope for its future. As Lorris explained, Yellow Brick House has been in operation for 40 years serving York region and has significantly grown since its inception which began from a need for a shelter in the community. They now offer both intervention and prevention services- their intervention services include: two emergency shelters, transitional housing and community counselling and supportive services. The community counselling and supportive services offer an array of programs: individual counselling for both women and children, Mothers in Mind, a trauma informed dyadic group for women and their children under the age of 4, family court support, Let`s Talk, a group program for children ages 4-18 and their mothers, Handle with Care, a parenting support group women with children and 24/7 crisis and support line. Their prevention services include: public education for elementary schools, high schools and post-secondary institutions, hosting public events, and raising awareness of their services and the effects of Domestic Violence (DV) in their region.

                One of the organizations’ projects that Lorris highlighted was the campaign to build a

second shelter in York region. The campaign was driven by the agency who saw an increase in

need for additional emergency beds as the region was growing and furthermore, the number of

women and children who weren’t able to get into a shelter in the region was quadruple the

number that could get a bed in a shelter. Despite not having financial support from the

government at the time and the campaign taking place during the 2008-2009 recession, the

organization was still able to successful raise enough funds to build a second shelter in their

region. The second shelter has been in operation for six years now and has been able to meet

the ever-increasing need for emergency shelter for women and children.

                Lorris also spoke about a program that their organization offers to mothers with

children four years old and under called Mothers in Mind. They are the only agency in York

region who have the certification to deliver this program. This unique group support program is

offered to mothers once a week to discuss topics around the impact of domestic violence on

parenting ability and interaction with children, and re-establishing and reaffirming the

connection between the mother and child. The program also introduces participation exercises

that can be done with children such as play therapy. An important piece that this program

addresses is the need to involve children after domestic violence has happened in the family.

Research shows the physical and mental impact that domestic violence has on the development

of a child and their future relationships. Yellow Brick House was also able to administer the

program in collaboration for the first time to an agency serving young mothers in Newmarket

and hopes to connect with other agencies across York region in order to offer the program.

                When discussing the multitude of services and programs that Yellow Brick House

offers, the passion and drive for Lorris in this work is clear: “We are in [this line of work] because

we have a passion to help women and their children rebuild their lives after experiencing

                                                  devastating effects of violence”. Being a woman, Lorris can understand some of the challenges that come                                                    with gendered violence such as gender discrimination, sexism and oppression. Some of the most                                                                  rewarding aspects of this work for her is to create connections with people that Yellow Brick House is                                                            serving and to guide their clients on a path that develops their relationship with their child and themselves.                                                    Lorris and the staff of Yellow Brick House are proud to offer wrap around supports to identify family needs                                                      and customize their programs and services to the individual. If there are needs that are outside of the                                                            scope of the organization, they have networks within the community to fill that gap so all short and long-                                                        term needs are identified and dealt with on an on-going basis.

                                                  Some of the challenges that comes with this work is the precarious nature and lack of sustainable funding: “                                                 [funding] is related to our ability to save lives”, says Lorris. This was the case for the second shelter that                                                        they opened six years ago. This shelter is still not sustainably funded, therefore Yellow Brick House has to                                                      self-fund to keep the doors open. While the shelter did meet a need to house women and children, the                                                          organization is seeing an increase again in the population and number of women and children in need of                                                      emergency shelter, so much so that they could use a third or fourth shelter to reach this demand. With the                                                    high demand for services also comes an increase in the complexity of issues that clients face and, in turn,                                                    an increase of pressure for the staff to develop their skills to address their client’s needs. Based on the                                                          geographic location of their organization, many newcomer women who don’t have permanent status in Canada or who are perhaps sponsored by their abuser to be in Canada are reaching out for support from Yellow Brick House. With this comes an array of challenges, such as language barriers, cultural barriers, sexual and/or physical abuse that occurred in their home country, effects of war and civil unrest, and financial instability. One way they attempt to mitigate these challenges is by hiring staff who speak more than one language. As a result of this, Yellow Brick House can provide services in almost 40 different languages.

                Being in this line of work, Lorris has seen a shift in the way feminism is used today compared to eight years ago. In the past, people would argue to what extent someone might be a feminist or how far their definition of feminism could go. However, over the years, she has seen an increase of collaboration, sharing and rapport building between community partners where previously, this didn’t exist. The shift in using feminism as a philosophy for one’s organization or agency has been a positive change because it allows each client to be viewed individually: “We don’t know what a client’s experience has been, what her journey has been or what her culture is that impacts how she viewed her role in our society”, states Lorris.

                As far as the Violence Against Women (VAW) sector being politicized in the work that they do, Lorris agrees that it is but it shouldn’t be; she states, “The work that we do should not be on a political agenda, it should be a political focus [of all parties] to eradicate violence against women and children and a top priority for all politicians in power”. Woman`s safety is not a political issue and we need every party`s commitment to the current gender based violence strategy as an investment in our sector is a pledge to protect all women and children in Ontario. As Ontario is approaching a provincial election in June 2018, it is always nerve-racking how different political parties will impact the sector by either continuing and/or increasing funding or reducing or demolishing funding all together.

                In closing, one hope that Lorris has for the VAW Forum of Central Region is to strengthen collaboration and networking between agencies. For one, she would like to have the ability to share resources amongst different agencies and organizations so things like training and workshops aren’t repeated and are inclusive across the Central Region. She would also like to see service mapping to identify what each agency provides in terms of programs, services and supports which could be used as a tool for staff to connect clients with other agencies in different areas. It would also serve to identify service gaps that could guide program development and funding allocation to improve outcomes for families.

                Thank you again to Lorris Herenda for sharing her work and passion for this sector with me. It is clear that she loves the challenging work that she and the staff of Yellow Brick House do.