Iowa domestic violence survivors often must shelter in hotels

IOWA CITY — An Iowa City nonprofit is hosting a benefit Friday to raise money for hotel vouchers that domestic violence survivors can use to get away from their abusers.

Iowa has 342 beds in domestic violence shelters, but only 75 percent of those beds are regularly in use, according to the Iowa Coalition Against Domestic Violence.

Those open beds, though, tend not to be in rural areas, which lack brick-and-mortar shelters, meaning those fleeing domestic violence need transitional housing, such as hotel rooms.

Having access to hotel vouchers allows them and their children to remain in their home communities as they seek assistance, according to Lindsay Pingel, the Iowa coalition’s director of community engagement.

Housing vouchers, however, are more expensive than traditional shelter beds.

A donation of $40 will pay for a night in a domestic violence shelter, but it takes an $80 donation to pay for a hotel voucher, according to Alta Medea, director of community engagement at the Domestic Violence Intervention Program in Iowa City.

To raise funds for those vouchers, DVIP holding a Rad New Wave Benefit concert on Friday, July 7, at the James Theater in Iowa City, beginning at 7 p.m.

Lack of housing keeps survivors in shelters longer

On average, it takes seven attempts before a domestic violence victim permanently leaves their abuser, advocates said.

Complicating factors are the threat of violence if they leave, the lack of affordable housing and other financial barriers, Medea said.

“There's a lot of factors that go into the challenges and barriers that survivors face when fleeing a dangerous situation,” she said. “Certainly, the lack of beds and a limited number of resources that can be allocated to the great need, are a barrier.”

Iowa is short almost 60,000 affordable housing units, according to the National Low Income Housing Coalition. More than 65 percent of extremely low-income tenants pay almost half their income in rent.

That financial reality prevents many domestic violence victims from leaving their abusers, Medea said.

Some 97 percent of domestic violence survivors are financially abused — they don’t have access to their paycheck, are isolated from work, or have poor credit ratings — making it difficult for them to gain stable housing in a tight rental market, she added.

“Many of them only have the clothes on their back when they arrive at our emergency shelter,” she said.

DVIP’s 35-bed shelter is able to find permanent housing for 67 percent of the survivors who enter its program, Medea said.

Those fleeing abuse are supposed to stay at the DVIP shelter a maximum of 40 to 45 days, but the lack of affordable housing has pushed that average to 48 days, she said.

The shelter served 368 domestic abuse survivors last year but had to divert 350 to 400 individuals to other accommodations — finding a nearby shelter with open beds, a hotel room, transitional housing or remaining in their home with a new safety plan.

“We are actually full 365 days out of the year, and we have been since we opened our doors in 1979,“ Medea said.

DVIP recently broke ground on a new, larger, shelter in Iowa City to double its number of beds.

Pingel, from the Iowa Coalition Against Domestic Violence, said the coalition is working in every Iowa community to provide an easily accessible emergency shelter and affordable housing.

“Finding affordable housing is becoming harder and harder to access in rural communities that have less resources,” Pingel said. “... It is harder to access affordable housing with wages not going up and prices rising — everything is adding up, to make it more difficult for survivors to leave dangerous situations.”

Reproductive abuse

Another factor that traps domestic abuse victims, Medea said, is the lack of access to reproductive health care, which can force victims to carry their abuser’s child to term. It’s something abusers use to keep their victims from leaving.

“Reproductive abuse is one way that perpetrators are able to keep survivors home and prevent them from leaving, using children as part of their tactics to control and abuse, along with pets,” Medea said.

Pingel said the Iowa coalition focuses on being survivor centered — giving survivors the autonomy to choose their own path and supporting them on that journey — and that includes bodily autonomy.

“When we look at barriers to access we know that survivors have an acute, timely need for reproductive health care that includes abortion,” Pingel said. “Domestic violence is about power and control, and that includes reproductive abuse.”

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