SHELTER FOR FREEDOM

Shelter for Freedom is a community-wide, five-day event designed to educate, motivate, and donate. It provides an opportunity to make a direct impact in the local and global community: globally by educating about human trafficking and how you can stop it. All proceeds go towards benefitting Helpline’s new Women’s Shelter.

Mission Statement: Shelter for Freedom seeks to raise awareness of global human trafficking while providing local shelter and prevention.

Definition of Trafficking: Human Trafficking is the coercive control of a human being for the purpose of exploitation.

Most people associate human trafficking with the sex trade. Cargo: Innocence Lost documents “the dark underworld of sex trafficking through compelling interviews with some of the country’s top officials on the subject, victims’ advocates and victims themselves, who were rescued in Texas. . . . this must-see, thought-provoking film that is interwoven with a raw, intense narrative based on numerous true stories from victims of the sex trade. Cargo: Innocence Lost explores how the business of sex trafficking has become a $9 billion dollar a year industry and why it still remains a shrouded crime in our nation” (http://www.cargoinnocencelost.com/home.html).

However, human trafficking involves far more than the sex trade. The ILO reports, “At least 12.3 million people around the world are trapped in forced labour. . . . Forced labour takes different forms, including debt bondage, trafficking and other forms of modern slavery. The victims are the most vulnerable – women and girls forced into prostitution, migrants trapped in debt bondage, and sweatshop or farm workers kept there by clearly illegal tactics and paid little or nothing” (http://www.ilo.org/global/Themes/Forced_Labour/lang--en/index.htm). Many do not realize the strong possibility that the coffee they drink, the chocolate they eat, the clothes they wear, the components of their cells phones and computers come from forced labor. The Wall Street Journal reports that the down-turn in the global economy is increasing human trafficking (http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2009/06/16/state-department-says-economic-crisis-fuels-human-trafficking/). This five-day event raises awareness of human trafficking and how you can assist in ending it while at the same time giving you the opportunity to make a real difference in our local community.

Helpline (www.helplineww.org) is the primary screening and referral agency in the Walla Walla Valley for emergency social services.  Helpline assesses the needs of individuals and families in crisis and assists them through direct services and advocacy, maximizing the use of non-duplicated community resources and education for long-term self-help.

The Shelter for homeless women is a place where women can safely begin the process of life change through case management and accountability, provided in an environment of dignity, respect and compassion.  The shelter provides services that allow women to transition to permanent housing, achieve independent living and overcome the cycle of homelessness resulting in freedom from the streets and poverty.

The goal of the Shelter For Freedom weekend will benefit the Women’s Shelter facility. The shelter facility will be approximately 3,000 square feet and will provide night shelter for up to 20 women along with separate day shelter area housed within the complex.  Currently, the Women’s Shelter leases a temporary facility in Walla Walla but is only guaranteed less than a year of service at that location.  Not only would it preserve continuity but it would also provide considerable cash savings to Helpline by owning rather than renting a women’s shelter facility.