Mercy Center Annual Appeal 2022-23

Mercy Center for Women

ANNUAL APPEAL

Doubling our capacity to serve Erie's homeless

Dear friends, As we anxiously await the opening of the Mercy Anchor Community Center, we’re also excited to share this annual report with you—to showcase some of the accomplishments we’ve achieved this past year. The belief of our donors, business supporters, and community friends provides this opportunity for development. The journey has been one of passion and reflects what lies in our hearts.

Jennie Hagerty Executive Director

What inspires one to open their heart and passionately give? We would speculate several reasons. Giving makes one feel alive.

The opportunity to support a remarkable mission which embraces women and children looking for their “second chance” to simply make life right. The course is slow for many served at the Mercy Center. One cannot accomplish a marathon without having the means necessary to accomplish success—the proper training, equipment, and determination. The same can be said for the Mercy Center women and children.

Through our clients, we continue to learn the meaning of love, forgiveness, and the pride that comes from both small and large accomplishments. The beauty of celebrating sobriety, graduating from drug treatment court, and reunifying with a child are a few ways in which your generosity delivers a hopeful future. There is no science to dealing with these struggles.

Unfortunately, they are a reality. But with each hill conquered comes one more reason to smile. Like celebrating a toddler's first step, our women take many steps each leading in a different direction, each with a reason to celebrate. The same door they passed through at the Mercy Center, feeling scared and alone, will be celebrated upon program completion as they exit.

Through your generosity, the Mercy Center for Women can share in this report our vision of transformation which is becoming a reality. The Mercy Center will be impacting even more lives in the coming year through our expansion at the Mercy Anchor Community Center. We will blossom into new beginnings for our community with two programs to serve those experiencing homelessness. We have you to thank for this.

Thank you for being their hope! Please take time to read through this report and the uplifting stories in it. You have made giving to others easy. The mustard seed planted at 1039 East 27th Street continues to bring hope and opportunity. Our mustard seed grew into the Mercy Anchor Community Center and for that we are so grateful.

I invite you to envision what our women experience when they ring our doorbell for the first time. Imagine your life closing in on you. Your life treasures must fit into just two large bags. Our women walk into the Mercy Center with the clothes on their back and all their belongings packed into these bags. When they graduate from here, they take with them so much more. Some will have corrected past mistakes and established healthy relationships with their children. All will have their self-esteem, a greater understanding of their finances, a network of support services to help them through future challenges, and permanent housing. Survival in the end conquers fear and their selfsufficiency shines through.

Smile, Pray, Be Kind,

Jennie Hagerty Executive Director

"If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed, nothing shall be impossible unto you."

Matthew 17:20

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Doubling our capacity to serve Erie’s homeless Mercy Anchor Community Center | 1012 E. 28 St. | Erie, Pa.

An innovative, new housing program for those previously homeless will be opening soon in southeast Erie in the Mercy Anchor Community Center (MACC).

The Mercy Center for Women conducted a highly successful capital campaign which raised the necessary funds to convert a vacant school building into this complex. But MACC will be much more than housing. It will also act as a community hub and will offer technology and pre-employment training, GED coursework, a gymnasium, food pantry, thrift store, meeting rooms, and community gardens. Primary health care and behavioral health services will also be available in the building’s lower level.

The Mercy Center’s transitional housing program will continue to house women and children experiencing homelessness. MACC will broaden residency to include males and their families.

The two Mercy Center programs will house as many as 64 residents, double our current capacity. Thirtytwo women and children can reside in the transitional housing program for up to one year, and 32 additional residents in MACC for up to two years.

The need to safely house and provide other basic needs for women and children in Erie has grown tremendously this past year. With your support and others in our community, the most vulnerable are being helped. On behalf of them, we thank you

Meet Maureen Her entire life Maureen has cared for others. In her work and in her family, she has always put everyone else first. It took a health scare for her to realize she must take care of herself before she can give to others.

Maureen grew up in Erie, Pa., with her parents and six siblings.

The family was not well off, but her father instilled in them a love for adventure and would take the family on spontaneous escapades. Though life within her immediate family was stable, Maureen and her sister Patty were faced with traumatizing situations involving abuse from an extended family member.

Although the abuse bonded her sister and her for life, it would also prove to be extremely detrimental to their mental and physical well-being.

At the age of 20, Maureen was already married with two children. To distance herself from her abusive family member, she and her new family moved to Texas which was the first of many moves for Maureen. Circumstances in her life did not improve, however, as her husband also began to abuse her.

Maureen would escape an abusive situation yet again and return to Erie, leaving her soon-to-be ex-husband. Now older and stronger, she felt better equipped to deal with her family dynamics.

It took a friend convincing Maureen to see a doctor who determined her lump was benign and she once again returned to Erie to live. Although Maureen had her physical health squared away, she was still dealing with her mental health and was now looking for a place to live. Maureen slept at friends' houses and unsafe shelters for many months. At what seemed like the perfect time, Maureen then received a call from the Mercy Center informing her she was accepted into the program.

Since Maureen has been at the Mercy Center, she has realized the importance of self-care. She has lived her sister's legacy of helping others, but now realizes that working on herself both physically and mentally must be her number one priority.

Maureen is once again focusing on her creative side by writing and creating art. One of her favorite projects at the Mercy Center has been painting the mural on the center’s community room wall.

Maureen feels as though she has lived many lives, but she is happy to be beginning a new, healthier version at the Mercy Center. She is engaged in meaningful work and hopes to one day complete her college degree and tell her story in an autobiography.

During this time, Maureen threw herself into her creative side.

She went to cosmetology school and worked as a makeup artist in theatres and haunted houses. Maureen also found love and married her second husband which was the beginning of a loving 18-year marriage. Everything would change, however, when she lost two loved ones to suicide: a good friend of hers and her 44-year-old sister Patty. Patty had battled bipolar disorder her entire life, and since Maureen was by her side from the beginning, this devastated her. Maureen had dealt with her own depression from a young age, so these two events further deepened her depression.

Because her sister, too, had lived an adventurous life and cared for others, Maureen vowed to continue that lifestyle and do so in her sister’s honor. This began her years of living in several states working various jobs as a caregiver. Maureen considers most of the jobs she held to be “end-of-life jobs,” meaning, she worked in hospice care and was a caregiver for those at the end of their lives.

Although Maureen loved being there for others, the environment began to take its toll on her when several of her patients died within a short period of time. The suffering around her brought back the pain of her sister’s passing and began to take its toll on Maureen. This along with finding out she may have cancer put her into an even deeper depression.

Maureen was one of several residents who participated in the center's community room mural project. Ever the creative soul, she also enjoys cooking, writing, and being an involved mother in her children's lives.

Those we served FY 2021-22

Women with children Single women Children

Total

20 17 33 70

Women with mental health diagnosis History of domestic violence Fleeing from domestic violence Drug and/or alcohol dependency Chronically homeless Homeless Youth (18-24)

78% 84% 43% 62% 5% 22%

Aftercare Program

Mercy Anchor Community Center | 1012 E. 28th St. | Erie, Pa. At the Mercy Center for Women, staff remain in contact with alumnae long after they have received services. From providing Thanksgiving meal baskets to Christmas gifts for their children, Mercy Center graduates know they can count on staff to continue to support them however they need.

Aftercare Women Participants Aftercare Children Participants

18 25