Outside, the two-story yellow brick building looks like any other apartment complex. Inside, a 44-year-old mother’s smile gleams like the large sterling and turquoise heart-shaped pendant she received for Christmas. “I’m getting my children back next month,” she says.
LaChelle moved into Warren’s Beatitude House, a transitional housing facility, last November. The former medical assistant and recovering addict is working toward her bachelor’s in drug and alcohol counseling.
“I want to help other women with what I’ve been through,” she says. “I lost everything through my addiction.”
Beatitude House will provide LaChelle and her four children with a safe, fully furnished apartment for up to two years. During that time, she may come and go as she pleases.
“It’s not like a homeless shelter; it’s a home,” says development associate Casey Bertolette. “The women have their own apartments. They have so much independence.”
However, Beatitude House does enforce a curfew at night. “If you have a child, you don’t need to be out gallivanting in the evening,” she says.
To remain at Beatitude House, LaChelle must maintain custody of her children, stay drug- and alcohol-free and continue taking classes. In return, she will gain parenting skills and the tools she needs to become emotionally and economically self-sufficient.
Thanks to the $1.5 million donated by local foundations, organizations and other benefactors, the facility recently added six apartments, staff offices, a laundry room, a classroom, a children’s playroom and a full-time child advocate.
Beatitude House’s ability to accommodate more women and children aids Warren’s ailing economy. By obtaining a degree or their GED, the women become employable, which enables them to become renters or homeowners and to spend more money and pay more taxes. Nearly 90 percent of those who have completed the program haven’t returned to homelessness.
“The support has been great. They even started AA meetings here yesterday on my behalf because of the baby,” says LaChelle, glancing at the sleeping bundle wrapped in blankets. She gave birth the first week of January.
“So I’ve been hangin’ in there, doing well, taking things one day at a time,” she says, still beaming.
“The women just open up so much more in our environment,” says Bertolette, who joined Beatitude House in August. “A lot of the women won’t look you in the face when they first get here, and it’s amazing to see the changes that they go through.”