Women’s Warming Center Set to Close

New Haven’s only all-women warming center is set to close next week after a change in promised funding from the city.

Since November, a new warming center in Newhallville known as Total Mankind Ministry has functioned as a safe haven for women in need of a place to sleep.

According to staff, the center has been a needed refuge for women facing domestic violence or fearing harassment in mixed-gender spaces who have not secured a bed in a women’s homeless shelter. After the warming center closes on Tuesday, those women will have limited options for a place to stay.

Unlike at a homeless shelter, women can drop by the warming center at any point during its hours and stay for as long or as briefly as they like. The warming center does not offer beds or cots, but it does provide yoga mats and blankets for guests to sleep on.

While homeless shelters have stringent rules about sobriety, women who are drunk or high are allowed at the Total Mankind Ministry warming center as long as they do not bring drugs onto the premises.

“Sometimes they come in and you can tell they’ve had a little something,” said Annette Ridenhour, the warming center’s manager. ​“We don’t discriminate.”

During the winter, the city opens an all-male ​“overflow shelter” with 75 new beds in anticipation of an increase in individuals seeking an indoor place to sleep during the cold winter months. A mixed-gender warming center in the West River neighborhood also opened up in January 2020.

Seeking to provide a place for women to sleep during November and December, the city worked with Grace Chapel Church to establish the Total Mankind Ministry warming center for the first time this winter. The center was meant to be a temporary resource, initially slated to last from November 22, 2019 until January 2, 2020, until the mixed-gender warming center opened up.

Total Mankind Ministry secured $22,000 in funding from the city’s Office of Housing and Homelessness to provide space for 25 women during that time.

After seeing the warming center in practice, the Total Mankind Ministry board members and staff came to believe that a women-only warming center in Newhallville served as an essential resource that the mixed-gender center in West River could not replace.

On Dec. 31, Total Mankind Ministry representatives met with Toni Harp on her last day as mayor of New Haven, searching for more funding. They said Harp promised the warming center $60,000 from the city’s budget — enough to keep the program open through April 19.

But when Mayor Justin Elicker took office in 2020, his administration reassessed Harp’s decision before the contract was finalized. The city decided to lower the additional funds to $25,000, allowing the center to remain open until March 3.

Mehul Dalal, the city’s acting community services administrator, said that the initial promise of $60,000 toward the warming center was not the best use of city funds.

“City staff initiated the process of drawing up a new Agreement with Total Mankind Ministry per the prior Administration’s promise of funding,” Dalal wrote in an email to the Independent, ​“however upon review of the scope of services proposed we determined that continuing with the $60,000 figure did not make prudent programmatic or fiscal sense.”

Dalal argued that only a few women have utilized the warming center, and that the per-person cost of the center was unusually high. The city typically spends between $15,000 and $22,500 to keep a 25-person warming center open for 60 nights, according to Dalal.

“We are keeping the Center open through March 3rd to allow for an orderly transition,” he added. He wrote that the city has ​“identified other critical immediate needs areas to assist individuals and families experiencing homelessness where the remaining resources will be put to use.”

The warming center has enough space for 25 women. The number of women who show up each night has fluctuated.

Deborah Conyers, a minister at Grace Chapel Church who founded the warming center, estimated that around four or five women came per night in December. According to the Dalal, the average during that time was three women per night.

Once the first contract ended on Jan. 2, the center was taken off the State of Connecticut’s 211 homeless services website. Conyers said that after the 2nd, ​“our numbers went down to one” per night. After Conyers and other advocates met with city officials, the warming center was relisted on the 211 site on Feb. 14.

Since the center was added back to 211’s list of resources, the number of women who come by has grown to between six and 12 women nightly, according to staff estimates.

“Those are six to twelve people that are actually getting off the streets every night,” said Larry Johnson, a security guard at the warming center. ​“It could be a totally different outcome if the warming center wasn’t there, Godforbid.”

Some women have been coming on a regular basis since the beginning, according to staff.

Delphine Clyburn, who represents the ward that includes the warming center on the Board of Alders, argued that ​“whether the numbers are low or not, we’re helping people.”

Filling a Gap

Total Mankind Ministry is one of two warming centers currently open in the city.

Several staff members noted that many of the women who come to the Total Mankind Ministry warming center have survived domestic violence or sexual assault. Conyers explained that some of the guests who have been ​“traumatized by men” have expressed that they feel less safe in mixed-gender shelters or warming centers.

Total Mankind Ministry is also the only designated place to sleep for the homeless in Newhallville. The warming center currently rents space from Christian Community Action at 660 Winchester Ave. The board of directors hopes to eventually move the center to Grace Chapel Church at 777 Dixwell Ave. in order to reduce overhead costs.

“This is a pretty central area for them,” Conyers said of the guests who come. (Guests at the warming center chose not to be interviewed for this story.)

Dalal noted that when Total Mankind Ministry shuts down in early March, the women can go to a warming center run by Omega Seventh Day Adventist Church or one run by the Grace and St. Peters Church in Hamden. Both of the alternative warming centers are mixed-gender spaces.

According to Google Maps estimates, the Omega warming center, located at 278 Winthrop Ave. in the West River neighborhood, is a 40-minute walk from 660 Winchester Ave. The Grace and St. Peters warming center, located at 2927 Dixwell Ave., is an hour and a half’s walk away.

“It’s almost like the jails dropping people off on corners in [unfamiliar] towns,” Conyers said of the city’s recommendation.

Annette Ridenhour, the warming center’s manager, suggested that moving to a new routine might pose a psychological hardship for the women at Total Mankind Ministry. She recalled one woman who has been clean for nearly a month, but who worries that moving to a homeless shelter would trigger her addiction.

“They’re used to this. We’re familiar to them,” Ridenhour said. ​“They would have to start all over again. It’s not easy for them to do, to start trusting people.”

A Typical Night at the Center

On a typical night inside the Total Mankind Ministry warming center, women begin to arrive as early as 8 pm. The warming center is usually open through the night until 6 a.m. During extremely cold weather, the warming center is set up to accommodate women during the day as well, although that hasn’t occurred during this relatively warm winter season.

The center welcomes women ages 18 and up; many who come are in their fifties and sixties, according to Conyers, but women as young as their twenties have also shown up.

A female staff member pats down each guest upon her arrival and searches her bag for drugs and weapons.

Inside, hot beverages and snacks are available for free on a table in the main room.

Guests can accept donated clothing and toiletries. They can lay out yoga mats and blankets to sleep.

The lights in the main room go out at 10:15 p.m.

The warming center offers more than just an indoor place to sleep. Conyers stressed that the aim behind the warming center is to care for the ​“total needs of the person: physically, spiritually, emotionally, mentally.”

The Cornell Scott Hill Health Center provides medical services at the warming center. Until funding ran dry in 2020, the Community Action Agency of New Haven sent social workers to meet individually with women who showed up.

The women are always offered a hot meal. ​“We always give dessert,” added Ridenhour. Recently, they had a hot dog night. Sometimes, Ridenhour said, ​“I’ll make my ziti” or bring cupcakes for the guests. Her grandchildren, who love to bake, once made them a snowman-shaped cake.

“We have great conversations, and we laugh together a lot,” Ridenhour said of the warming center guests.

The center often hosts movie nights, making use of a small television in the main room.

Ridenhour recalled one conversation after they watched The Color Purple together. The movie, based on Alice Walker’s novel of the same name, centers around a black lesbian woman who survives sexual assault and domestic violence.

“We were talking about how well [the movie] was made. We all related to it,” Ridenhour said. ​“Life as a woman can be sometimes very challenging.”

Richard Gomez (pictured), another staff member at Total Mankind Ministry, also spoke to a culture of community at the warming center. He said he’s noticed that some of the women who come regularly share tips and resources with one another.

“They figured out a way to help each other,” he said.

Conyers recalled that one night, police officers discovered a woman who was passed out. When the officers asked the woman for her home address, Conyers said the woman gave them the address of the warming center, 660 Winchester Ave.

A Community Rallies

The warming center’s board of directors said they planned to continue advocating for more city funds. They also expressed hope that members of the public would donate to help keep the warming center open.

“We will continue. This is not going to stop us from doing what we’re doing,” said Pastor Samuel White, who serves on the board.

Conyers said that when she met with staff members last week to discuss the warming center’s impending closure on March 3, ​“they were all coming up with ways to keep this open.”

The board stressed that the warming center employs residents of New Haven, many of whom are from Newhallville. The center has nine employees: 6 residential workers (including a manager who runs the warming center every night of the week), two security guards, and an administrative assistant.

“Not only are we helping the community,” said Larry Johnson, the security guard at the warming center, ​“the warming center actually employs people in our community.”

Johnson said he just got out of prison and has no other income. ​“It was hard for me to find a job,” he said. He learned about the job opportunity through Grace Chapel Church, where he grew up. His father, Elder Larry Johnson, is on the warming center’s board.

According to Johnson, the financial support from the job has been crucial for himself and his two kids. ​“This is helping me as well because it helps me stay grounded and humble. Me going in there every night helps me to realize: that could be me.”

On Tuesday, at the February meeting of the Newhallville Community Management Team in the Lincoln-Bassett Community School cafeteria, Minister Conyers updated residents about the status of the warming center. She called the center a crucial resource for ​“women that have been traumatized,” prompting nods throughout the room.

“We need to sit with that for a second,” Management Team Chair Kim Harris said.

Alder Clyburn told the Independent that she is planning a public hearing about the matter, at a date to be determined. Harris urged attendees of the meeting to show up to the hearing.