Our Organization Helps Survivors Of Intimate Partner Violence. We May Not Have Enough Funding To Keep Going
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As the executive director of Ontario’s York Region Centre for Community Safety, I encounter survivors of intimate partner violence, or IPV, nearly every day. Some survivors arrive at our door with nothing but their children and a bag of essentials. Others carry the invisible scars left by years of control and abuse. We wrap them in whatever care they need, removing the burden of navigating complex systems at a time when survivors are simply trying to survive.
There was the woman who had recently arrived in Canada, bravely voicing her frustration: “How are we supposed to know our rights if no one tells us?” She didn’t know that in an emergency, she could call 911. Her lack of knowledge wasn’t a failure on her part, but a failure of systems meant to protect women and children.
Another survivor—a mother, like so many others—is still navigating the manipulation that had continued long after her abusive relationship ended. Her ex-partner calls her neglectful and irresponsible, repeating the harmful narrative used against numerous survivors with children. But when I sat with her recently, I saw a secure child, joyful and free in his mother’s presence.
These survivors are resilient and rising towards a hopeful future. On a daily basis, they inspire me to continue this challenging work, and to ensure that our small but mighty agency remains open.
But here’s the unvarnished truth: There is a desperate need for funding support for agencies like ours. And if things don’t change, in two years, there will be no door like ours for survivors to knock on.
Violence against women remains one of the most pervasive yet under-acknowledged crises of our time. The World Health Organization has declared it a global public health problem of epidemic proportions. More than 100 Ontario municipalities have declared intimate partner violence an epidemic. Still, we continue to lose women to femicide—women whose lives could have been saved if organizations like ours were better funded and better understood. The most common misconception I encounter is that all agencies like ours are 100-percent funded by the government, when in fact, most of our funding comes from donors.
A 2018 study found that nearly half of women and girls who had ever been in an intimate relationship experienced some kind of IPV. Advocates have been sounding the alarm on this public health crisis for years. During the pandemic, agencies like mine worked hard to meet the increasing demand for support. Our most stunning increase came in 2024, when we served 845 survivors (mostly women), up from 657 the previous year. The Ontario Provincial Police reported an 18.1 percent increase in IPV incidents during that time. The York Regional Police, one of our partner agencies, responds to more than 6,000 such calls every year. These numbers represent only a tip of the proverbial iceberg, since IPV is an underreported crime.
Behind these numbers are children who are also victims—witnesses whose lives are forever changed by what they’ve seen and heard at home, the place that is meant to be their sanctuary. We served 1,205 children last year alone, up from 978 the previous year.
Despite the growing demand, only 35 percent of our budget comes from government funding—a jigsaw puzzle of different grants from different agencies at various levels of government. The money is often project-based, always with an end date, and it rarely covers operational costs. Next year, the portion of government funding we receive will drop to an unsustainable, inexplicable six percent.
We are not alone in this. Many agencies performing this critical work are living paycheque to paycheque, not knowing whether they’ll be there to support survivors the following year.
We work at the edges of capacity every day—because the women and families we serve can’t wait. Chronic underfunding forces us to stretch already-limited resources, all while trying to protect our staff from burnout in a system that leaves little room to breathe.
Earlier this month, we launched our annual Domestic Violence Awareness Month campaign. We called it “Invest in Hope.”
Hope flips the script. When a woman who has been told repeatedly that she is worthless and a bad mom finally hears she is worthy and capable, she can be empowered to navigate the difficult path forward.
Hope creates a healthier future for boys and girls. Boys who witness violence in the home are more likely to perpetuate it as men; girls are more likely to be victimized by it as women. Disrupting this cycle can pay dividends, immediately and for generations to come.
And hope creates a more prosperous community for all. A federal government study—commissioned in 2009, when rates of IPV were lower than they are today—estimated the total economic impact of spousal violence, in the span of one year, to be $7.4 billion, amounting to $220 per Canadian. These costs are carried by victims and survivors, by taxpayers and by the private sector.
But IPV is costing more than courtrooms, healthcare bills and lost productivity. It’s costing safety. It’s costing healthy childhoods, healthy adolescent years and healthy adult years for children who witness violence in their homes. And it’s costing lives. Women and children are dying in this country, and the cost of that pain and suffering is immeasurable. Last year, 100 lives were lost to intimate partner homicide in Canada.
When survivors reach out for support, what they all share is the need to be seen, to be heard and to believe that hope is possible. Hope is not a luxury for women and children fleeing violence. It’s survival.
And when survivors are wrapped in care, they are empowered to heal. When mothers have the space to heal, so do children. Every dollar invested in safety and healing for survivors is an investment in prevention, stability and a future free from violence.
Jaspreet Gill is the executive director of the York Region Centre for Community Safety.
