For more than thirty years, The Retreat has been a safe haven for families in crisis, providing domestic violence and sexual assault services along with education to families, friends and neighbors in Suffolk County. As part of the East End Fund for Children—a newly launched coalition of seven local non-profits—the organization hopes to increase awareness of issues affecting the local community while bolstering its impact in addressing those issues. Loretta Davis, The Retreat’s Executive Director, recently spoke about how The Retreat responded to the pandemic, COVID’s lasting impact on families, and the benefits of collaboration.
Can you tell us a little bit about The Retreat and your role there?
The Retreat is a nonprofit domestic violence, sexual assault agency that provides free services and prevention programs to children and adults impacted by violence and abuse. Our mission is to break the cycle of violence. Our kids and adults want to live free of violence and abuse and we provide support to help them achieve this.
As the Executive Director of this incredible organization, I lead this agency with the help of a dedicated and skilled Retreat team which includes an engaged and talented Board of Directors. We are able to provide free services and prevention education programs because of the tremendous support we have from our community of donors, volunteers. and grantors.
How has COVID impacted The Retreat’s role in the community? How have you had to change over the last year?
COVID impacted The Retreat in so many ways. During the Pandemic it became clear that it was not safe for survivors to be isolated and trapped with the abuser. Abuse and violence sky rocked in homes around the world. Survivors reached out to The Retreat for food needs as well as shelter as they knew we were available 24/7 through our multilingual hotline. Families throughout Suffolk County were not able to feed their families so The Retreat assisted in this new way of providing food to families who were not at our secure and safe shelter, The Stephanie House. The shelter remained fully open during COVID which meant we had to take extra steps to make the shelter safe and healthy for children and adults and for our staff. Our counseling, legal, advocacy and case management services were offered through virtual platforms or phone sessions so that we stayed connected to survivors. Our multilingual 24/7 hotline was always accessible to connect survivors to services. We continued to counsel children as young as 3 years old. Our prevention education programs continued to grow and reach grammar schools through high schools, graduate schools and dental and medical schools through new and innovative platforms that engaged the students.
What long term impact do you think the pandemic will have upon the audience you serve?
We provide services to all individuals and most of our shelter residents are children. However, many of our adult survivors are women and women have disproportionately lost their jobs during COVID. So in addition to financial abuse–not allowing a victim to work, ruining a victim’s credit, withholding money for food—there is also emotional, psychological and physical abuse. The impact of the abuse does not just disappear. It takes courage and hard work to change one’s life. The Retreat provides the services and support to assist individuals with the impact of abuse and violence. Survivors inspire us because of the many challenges and barriers they face. Our services provide hope to survivors.
How do envision the East End Fund for Children benefiting families living and working on the East End?
The EEFC provides access to vulnerable kids and adults through our networking, referrals, collaborative nature and our alliances. Together, we enrich the lives of the children and families we serve since we each offer educational services as well as unique services. We often collaborate when we provide these services. For example, CMEE provides that ‘night at the museum for our shelter kids’ while the parents use CMEE classrooms for a financial empowerment Retreat workshop. It is a win-win situation.
What’s your favorite bit of good news that has come out the last year?
Globally, vaccines. Nationally, the election of Joe Biden. At The Retreat, responding to almost 3000 hotline calls in 2020 .