Safe House Secures new site
Alliance will relocate to current CJ Home Valley Bank
(From left) IVSHA Board Chairman Beth Williams, Home Valley Bank CEO Robert Ward, and IVSHA Executive Director Chris Mallette
Illinois Valley Safe House Alliance (IVSHA) has purchased the current Home Valley Bank building in Cave Junction and will move its operations there from quarters at I.V. Resource Center.
The new facility will be named the Home Valley Center for Advocacy, Resources, Education and Support (CARES), it was announced Wednesday, June 13.
IVSHA Executive Director Chris Mallette said that the existing bank structure will be remodeled and turned into an advocacy center, and that a safe house will be constructed elsewhere on the 1.27-acre property at Lister Street and Kerby Avenue.
Home Valley will vacate its current location there later this year. It will relocate to a new building under construction on Redwood Hwy. in CJ at the former site of Select Market, next to Caves Pharmacy.
The DMV office will stay in its portion of the building, continuing to pay rent.
Mallette said that she’s been working on securing a site since she began her position in October 2001, and that IVSHA has come a long way during the past few years. The Home Valley acquisition has been in the works for a year.
“We’ve taken some pretty big steps when you think that our first staff person was hired at the end of 2001 and we’re now in the process of hiring our sixth person,” Mallette said. “We’ve worked with over 2,400 adult and child survivors since then and built a whole program.”
Securing a permanent location will make it easier for IVSHA to achieve its goal of helping survivors of domestic abuse, Mallette said.
“This is taking us to a whole new level so we’ll be able to provide a whole lot of services and give a whole lot of support that we weren’t able to do because we were restricted by the size and location of our building,” she said. “This is a monumental achievement.”
The new site was appraised at $717,000, Mallette said. Home Valley contributed $147,000 toward the total, and IVSHA will pick up the remaining $570,000.
IVHSA still must raise approximately $591,000 toward the purchase price and remodeling costs of the existing building, Mallette said.
“The cost of the whole project, in phase one, is $1,066,000,” Mallette said. “We have commitments for $475,000.”
But she said that having a permanent location will make it easier to raise that money.
“We’ve had initial conversations with many regional foundations,” she said. “They were all interested in our project, but they wouldn’t act on our proposals until we had two things: proof that the community supports us and securing the site. I think we’ve done that.”
Phase two of the project will involve fund-raising to build the actual safe house. Mallette said that it is important for IVSHA to have a safe house and an advocacy center to better aid domestic violence victims.
“Having one without the other doesn’t really create meaningful change,” she said.
“If we don’t have a safe house we can put them in, we can do a lot of advocacy, but at some point, they’re going to need a home,” she added. “If they can’t find a home and they can’t afford it, they have to go back home to abusers or become homeless.”
IVSHA will continue looking to the community for support, but also will pursue grants from outside organizations, Mallette said.
“We have a pretty diversified funding plan in terms of what foundations we’re going to go to,” she said.
But having a permanent location should make it easier to secure those funds, and will demonstrate the community’s commitment to combatting domestic violence, she indicated.
“It’s going to send the message that we care,” Mallette said. "We know that we have a problem, but we care and will do whatever it takes to fix that problem.”
