Downtown Women's Center

Downtown Women's Center provides housing and supportive services for women seeking addiction recovery and their children. Dwc has three addictions recovery shelters, three retail thrift stores, and operates the meridian apartments for low and moderate income men and women, including the elderly and disabled. Abba house abba house has ten efficiency apartments and is utilized for women, with or without children, who are further along in the recovery program. Each woman who is moved to abba house has completed levels 1-3 of the recovery program. Residents continue working with their case manager on a weekly basis, attend the required amount of aa/na recovery meetings, and attend the two weekly mandatory house meetings. This is where the women moving from haven house are reunited with their children. They have more freedom and less oversight before they move to gratitude house.

Haven house haven house is a dormitory-style residence and the entry point for 17 homeless women without children and for pregnant women. The first phase of recovery is rigorously structured and focuses on becoming and staying clean and sober. Requirements include 30-day inpatient treatment outside of dwc, completion of dwc rad (rethinking alcohol and drugs) 45 day class, attending aa/na community meetings, finding part-time employment, attending mandatory in-house group meetings, and receiving professional counseling paid for by dwc. The women are constantly working toward relapse prevention and preparing to move to abba house after 4 months of being at haven house. These women come to dwc by referral from treatment centers, shelters, drug court, or individuals.

Gratitude house gratitude house is a 40-unit apartment complex gifted to dwc by baptist community services in 2016. It houses women, with or without children, in the third second phase of the dwc recovery program. Units are fully furnished. Residents pay minimal rent for a one-bedroom, two-bedroom, or townhome with utilities included. Women are employed and/or attend school, aa/na meetings, in-house meetings, receive counseling, and participate in case management. They learn budgeting, parenting skills, homemaking, and life skills. They work on self-esteem, deepen their spiritual beliefs and practices, and restore family relationships. Women set educational and financial goals as they return to productive, drug-free lives. As with haven house and abba house, gratitude house is staffed 24/7. Gratitude house is across a parking lot from opportunity school, which provides high-quality early education learning and care for preschool children ages 3-5. Opportunity school also offers on-site childcare at gratitude house for newborns to three-year-old children living at gratitude house and abba house.

Exempt achievement transitional housing program after graduating from dwc's recovery program, women with and without children may enter dwc's transitional housing program and continue living in the same apartment at gratitude house while receiving services and pursuing a higher education. Meridian apartments this 35-unit apartment complex provides quality, affordable housing for low-income individuals. Meridian apartments is a positive living environment for many elderly, disabled, mentally-challenged, and single adults. For fye 2023, meridian apartments housed 43 individuals. Retail stores dwc operates three retail thrift stores. Dwc receives about 140,000 in net profit annually from the retail stores. The stores have three purposes: to provide jobs for homeless women in our recovery program and others who are deemed 'unemployable,' to enable dwc to tithe out of in-kind donations to those in need, and to provide funding for the programs and administration of dwc. The retail stores work closely with over eighty amarillo area social service agencies, schools, and churches by donating clothing, household items, furniture, and appliances to those in need. For fye 2023, the stores helped 5,397 people through this voucher program. Dental care dental needs among the homeless are great. Dental issues can interfere with regular attendance and performance at work or school. Homeless children, who experience higher levels of dental disease than other children, often do poorly in school. Thanks to several local dentists, emergency dental care is provided to people who are homeless and living in one of amarillo's homeless shelters. Service to community a special emergency assistance fund is utilized to meet some of the needs for the approximately 20 to 30 people each month who contact dwc for help; dwc serves people who do not 'fit' the requirements of any other available social service assistance. The emergency needs may include food, hygiene products, rental assistance, utility assistance, bus tickets, gasoline, etc. In addition, dwc is working closely with united way's 211 emergency assistance program to start a call Center that will focus on those who are justice involved. During this pilot project period, dwc has assisted in providing case management and/or financial assistance to over 50 families.