Salute, Support Are In Order Here

A candle burning in a window has always signified a welcome to the weary. Wives of sailors lighted candles in the hope their men would return from the sea, exhausted but safe. The candle’s light says that no matter how dark or how stormy outside, a place exists inside that is bright and warm. Please come in.

The Downtown Women’s Shelter in Spokane closed its doors this week. Though organizers hope to reopen the shelter somewhere else sometime in the future, for now it is closed. A candle has gone out in our community.

The shelter opened a year ago to fill a niche not filled anywhere else. The shelter accepted women of the streets, women no other shelters would take in. Some were prostitutes, alcoholics, drug addicts and unwilling to vow to stop their behavior to receive shelter. Their families and friends had blown out candles of hope for some of them long ago. But the people who knew these women best, who knew them as human beings who had been wounded at the soul level by abuse, neglect and addiction, understood that they deserve clean, safe place to sleep. People such as Michael Yates, a Spokane police sergeant, and Lynn Everson, president of the Coalition for Women on the Street. And when the shelter opened, a serial killer was loose, a man who preyed on exactly the kind of women the shelter hoped to help.

Many in the community embraced the shelter project. Rooms were furnished with donations - nice ones, not leftover junk from yard sales. Spokane musicians donated time and talent for fund raisers. Hundreds gave small amounts of money.

In the end, it wasn’t enough to keep it open. The rent doubled and the shelter was not among the most popular charities. People who donate huge sums often like to see results. It’s human nature and nothing against the donors. And it’s not just a Spokane phenomenon. Two women’s shelters in Tacoma closed in early June due to lack of money.

Some of the women who came to the Downtown Shelter changed their lives. Some didn’t. The goal was not to convert, reform or rehabilitate them, though that did happen for some. The goal was to give them shelter. To accept them where they were in life. The dozens of community women and men who worked hard to envision the shelter and make it reality deserve congratulations and encouragement. You saw a need. You cared enough to try to fill that need. You raised awareness about a population, and a problem, most would like to ignore. This kind of effort can never be deemed a failure.