Nonprofit offers safe place for trauma, domestic violence survivors
By Corlyn Voorhees
THE ENTERPRISE December 26, 2019
BROCKTON – When struggling due to trauma or domestic violence, survivors have a place to go to at Family and Community Resources.
The Victorian home on Newton Street, converted into the home base for the nonprofit’s South Shore operations, provides a place for men, women and children to feel safe, said Nicole Modes, the director of mental health services. Family and Community Resources Inc. provides services to families affected by violence and trauma, Modes said, and annually it helps more than 2,500 people.
“We all do the best we can do to make sure every person that walks through those doors feel safe and comfortable here,” she said. “I think we do great work and we do the best we can to provide the best service possible to the clients that we serve.”
That trauma could be the sudden loss of a loved one, Modes explained, or domestic violence. It could also be surviving a disaster, like a house fire, or homelessness.
Often, people don’t realize how much the trauma has affected them, she said.
“People don’t always indicate that they’ve experienced trauma, but in speaking with them, they say, ‘Oh yeah, this event happened to me several years ago,’” Modes said. “They just know that right now they’re experiencing anxiety, or they might not kind of know that things they’ve experienced are actually trauma and it’s affecting them.
It’s important to note the signs and symptoms of trauma, Modes said, which includes things such as feeling numbness, being hyper-vigilant with a persistent feeling of being unsafe, avoiding people or places that remind them of the traumatic event, nightmares, difficulty sleeping and feelings of hopelessness or helplessness.
Once the person recognizes those signs, Modes said they can pursue help to come to terms with that trauma and learn how to cope.
That’s where Family and Community Resources staff come in. Its programs include mental health services such as support groups and therapy; domestic violence services, such as safe-home placements, providing food, toiletries and clothing and having advocates to accompany survivors to court; family stabilization and courtordered supervised visitation centers; and Intimate Partner Abuse Education Program for adolescent and adult offenders seeking rehabilitation.
Family and Community Resources is one of many organizations that receives funds through The Enterprise’s Helping Hands Fund, which has provided more than $1 million since its inception in the early 1990s to social service agencies in the Brockton area. Helping Hands funds for Family and Community Resources specifically support emergency services for clients, such as getting them into safe housing, Modes said.
In addition to direct services for clients, a large part of what they do is advocacy and outreach, said Christine Jones, director of domestic violence services. They try to target organizations that see domestic violence among the people they serve, she said, and they also go to schools to try to prevent domestic violence situations by teaching kids what a healthy relationship looks like.
“Just getting out there and talking about healthy relationships is a huge, huge thing,” she said. “Even at the high school level or earlier, things happen, situations occur, so just knowing that places are available, that we’re available to talk or have resources or support.”
Jones said Family and Community Resources also runs the Greater Brockton Area Task Force on Sexual and Domestic Violence that brings together members of the community, such as providers, law enforcement, the district attorney’s office and local and state agencies, to work on prevention and outreach.
“It feels like there’s such a higher need, that violence is occurring more frequently, unfortunately, every single day,” Modes said. “It creates this ripple effect in the community and all the more need for services.”
With recent grant funding, Family and Community Resources is also launching a rapid rehousing program for victims of domestic and sexual violence to help them to become self-sufficient, Jones said. The program will help people with getting into an apartment, job assistance, child care and educational needs for a one year.
Family and Community Resources staff have been organizing their adopt-a-family program, coordinating with community volunteers to buy presents for more than 60 families this year, Mode said.
“The thing about the holidays is that, especially the clients we’re serving, they’re already going through so much,” she said. “They may not have the money to provide what they would like to for their families for Christmas. It’s not about the gifts, but helping them have that sense of home and safety and being able to celebrate a holiday. When you don’t have the resources you need to make that happen, it’s not a great thing. Being able to help them provide that is really awesome.”
Staff writer Corlyn Voorhees can be reached at cvoorhees@enterprisenews.com.
■ Staff of Family andCommunity Resources Inc. in Brockton pose for a photograph on Monday. Family andCommunity Resources Inc. provides services to families affected by violence and trauma.
ALYSSA STONE/THE ENTERPRISE