During the holiday span, The Caring Place, a nonprofit social service organization serving the needs of domestic violence and sexual assault victims, had one night when nine clients arrived, including five children, all together, representing four families in need of service and assistance.
The Caring Place services victims in Lake, Porter and Starke counties in Northwest Indiana providing for clients at the 48-bed, 12-bedroom and six-bathroom ADA-compliant domestic violence shelter, the Center for Change, which opened in 2019 in Valparaiso.
In fall 2020, Denise Koebcke began her new role as the president and CEO for The Caring place and has seen the shelter’s census for client intake climb as high as 35 people residing at the shelter.
“The pandemic and various challenges faced by The Caring Place in the two years prior to my coming on board impacted staffing a great deal,” Koebke said, reflecting on her first leadership year for the organization.
“In 2019, when they moved into the new shelter, there were 26 staff members on payroll. When I began my transition to CEO, the number of staff on payroll had fallen to 14 and that included the former CEO and CFO who retired concurrently after the transition, so staff was then down to 12. I have spent the majority of my first year building our staff back up to levels needed to safely serve our growing number of clients.”
Koebcke said throughout the pandemic, all shelter volunteering and interning had to be placed on hiatus, further hampering staff support.
“In 2021, as it got safer to do so, we started rebuilding the volunteer program from scratch after two years without volunteers, and we have recruited some wonderful folks who come in and cook meals, work the hotlines and help with building and grounds maintenance and such,” Koebcke said.
“Unfortunately, the COVID numbers are exploding again with the omicron variant, and we are having to tighten up safety measures temporarily to keep everyone healthy, our biggest concern.”
While staffing has historically been a challenge for nonprofit organizations, Koebcke said that concern has grown significantly now that corporate entities are offering signing bonuses, other perks and higher wages that are not viable options for nonprofits to compete.
Established in 1977 by a group of volunteers in Hobart, including founder Mary Regina Mellon, The Caring Place agency grew during the two-decade leadership of Koebcke’s predecessor, Mary Beth Schultz, who started her role in June 2000, replacing Sharon Gilbert. Schultz retired in October 2020.
The added stress of the pandemic’s shelter-in months and mandates, as well as at-home virtual schooling and the mounting pressures of today’s pandemic pivot world, are the added expectations on society Koebcke said has sent emotions running high and resulted in increased cases for her organization.
“According to the Indiana Coalition Against Domestic, in Indiana alone from July 1, 2020, to June 30, 2021, domestic violence-related fatalities increased 181% over the same time period the year before,” Koebcke said.
“Whenever people are under stress and anxiety mounts, domestic violence increases.”
In addition to building more community partnerships, other accomplishments of the past year Koebcke and her team are beaming about include receiving 100% funding from the state for a two-year grant for a Children’s Services Specialist dedicated to working directly with all children and their parents. She has also completed a three-year strategic plan and the organization has sponsored and received training scholarships for the first Porter County Strangulation Response Team comprised of three Caring Place employees, a Porter County Sheriff’s officer, a representative from Northwest Health and a Porter County Deputy Prosecutor all led by The Caring Place Shelter Client and Community Services Manager Bessie Newkirk. She said the group will meet quarterly to promote awareness among health care and law enforcement professionals.
“We hope to continue to thrive in these challenging times by building and nurturing our dynamic, dedicated staff, keeping everyone safe and continuing to expand our programming and community outreach to not only shelter those in crisis but to create a community culture of upstream prevention of domestic violence,” Koebcke said.
“Our new strategic plan contains priorities such as expanding our mobile advocacy efforts and community engagement, growing our prevention and awareness programming like Amanda Forum and Let’s Start Talking, diversifying revenue streams and strategic partnerships, and professionalizing and updating agency policies and procedures.”
The 24-hour crisis line for The Caring Place is 219-464-2128 or 800-933-0466 or to donate or volunteer call 219-464-0840 or visit www.thecaringplacenwi.org
Philip Potempa is a freelance reporter for the Post-Tribune.
