1st Long-Term Shelter for Battered to Open in Valley

A $1.2-million no-interest loan approved Friday by the Los Angeles City Council will enable the San Fernando Valley’s only battered women’s shelter to quadruple operations by opening the county’s first large-scale, long-term housing project for victims of domestic violence.

The money, from an emergency earthquake fund supplied by the federal government, will be used by the Haven Hills shelter to buy a red-tagged apartment building in Canoga Park that will be repaired and converted into a “transitional housing” facility where battered women and their children can live for up to 18 months in 26 low-rent units.

Haven Hills currently has just 30 beds that clients must vacate after a month--not enough time for many abused women to break from their violent pasts, advocates say.

Approval of the loan is the latest in a series of actions by the City Council to bolster its image as a fighter of domestic violence in the wake of the intense publicity surrounding the O.J. Simpson case. Last June, the council agreed to spend $5 million annually to develop more women’s shelters.

“People, including some policy makers, haven’t been sensitive and conscious enough to focus on the problem” of domestic violence in the past, said Councilwoman Laura Chick, in whose district the new housing project will be located. “Sadly, it sometimes takes a celebrity case to draw the needed attention and resources.”

Providers of services to battered women hailed the development as important for victims of abuse, especially as the problem continues to rise. Last year, the number of reports of domestic violence grew 3.2% in Los Angeles, including a 6.5% increase in the Valley alone.

“You can stay in a shelter for about a month. That’s not a very long time to get counseling, get your children counseling, get a new job and start over, basically--even without the pressure of the batterer stalking you,” said Ellen Okamoto, community education coordinator for the nonprofit Los Angeles Commission on Assaults Against Women in Hollywood.

The Haven Hills housing project is expected to provide multi-bedroom apartments with full kitchens, parking, an enclosed play area for children and a community room for day-care and after-school programs. Officials hope to open the doors as early as mid-1996, drawing from their own small crisis shelter as well as other emergency refuges across the county.

“I hate to sound so trite, but I’m thrilled,” said Betty Fisher, executive director of Haven Hills. “It opens up so many more possibilities to work with domestic violence (victims) than we’ve ever had before.”

Work on the vacant, boarded-up complex will entail major reconstruction, including the conversion of some two-bedroom units into three- to four-bedroom apartments suitable for larger families.

About half of the $2.2 million needed for the project is to come from a conventional loan, federal housing tax credits and other sources, including a $100,000 grant from the state last summer, officials said. The loan approved Friday will account for the rest.

“This (loan) is a critical piece. This is do or die,” Fisher said before the council approved the loan.

Terms of the agreement require Haven Hills to pay back $280,000 when construction is finished, with the remainder payable over 30 years.

Haven Hills began moving toward construction of a long-term shelter three years ago, identifying an undeveloped lot in Councilman Joel Wachs’ district as suitable for such a housing project. The organization was in escrow on the property last year and was prepared to apply for a city loan.

However, a change in city policy to direct funds toward rehabilitating quake-damaged buildings forced Haven Hills to scuttle its original plan the day before escrow closed and instead search for a damaged apartment complex they could refurbish.

After several unsuccessful bids on other parcels, officials submitted an offer on the foreclosed Canoga Park site, an offer the local bank accepted last month.

The exact location of the facility is being kept secret to ensure the safety of its eventual tenants. But officials said the neighborhood is composed largely of similar apartment complexes, with easy access to supermarkets, schools, public transit and job sites.

Rental rates will range from about $270 to $475 a month, based on income.

“This is something to replicate in other parts of the city,” said Chick.

Fisher said her organization, established in 1971, will continue to run its hot line, counseling clinic and 30-bed emergency shelter even after the housing project opens.

“We’ll continue to operate that because it’s a first-line defense,” she said. “But in order to stabilize a family, we need more than 30 days in a crisis shelter.”

In a survey of the women at the shelter last year, four out of five responded that a month was too short a time to start afresh, which in many instances means leaving old jobs and cutting most previous ties to remain out of harm’s way.

“If a regular person were to think about moving, about divorce, about getting a new job or relocating, that is a tremendous task,” said Okamoto of the commission on domestic assault. “But then when you add the dynamic of abuse, it becomes almost overwhelming for some people.

“Sometimes they don’t have any other choice than to return to their batterer or become homeless.”