GUYSBOROUGH – Living in rural Nova Scotia often means driving an hour or more to access government and non-profit services. The Strait Area Women’s Place (SAWP) – a drop-in women’s centre in Port Hawkesbury that offers services and programs to all women – is working to reduce the distance between support and those in need by embarking on a road trip this summer to small communities in Guysborough, Inverness and Richmond counties.
“We have selected rural locations in which we will set up and offer program and service information, as well as an abundance of free personal care items, snacks and drinks while we meet locals and determine the needs for each community,” Jessica Simms-Barss – women’s support counselor – told The Journal in a June 23 email.
“It is our long-term goal to be able to offer our programs and services as outreach throughout our entire catchment area.”
Programs available through SAWP include workshops on self-esteem, anxiety, emotional eating, insomnia and building a budget, plus consent education and self-care. The organization also provides advocacy, support-based counselling, accompaniment, social programming and system navigation for women and adolescent girls by drop-in and/or appointment.
Simms-Barss wrote, “We recognize the challenges of rural living and the difficulties that creates in accessing services and we feel we have a lot to offer our surrounding communities … We have clients reaching out to the Strait Area Women’s Place asking about the possibility of bringing programming to the Guysborough area and indicating the need for accessible programming and services in their rural communities.”
Guysborough and Canso have access to a women’s outreach worker through the Antigonish Women’s Resource Centre and Sexual Assault Services Association (AWRC/SASA). Simms-Barss said that SAWP has a long-lasting relationship with the Antigonish-based organization and has “participated in many collaborative partnerships and opportunities and we are certain they would be supportive of us making more services available to rural women.”
As well as offering supports and programming to women, SAWP staff provides multiple supports to men, such as “supporting them to navigate the appropriate resources, financial and food security supports etc.,” wrote Simms-Barss.
The upcoming SAWP road tour will visit the Chedabucto Lifestyle Complex in Guysborough on Tuesday, July 6 – from 9:30 a.m. to noon – and The Front Porch Café in Mulgrave on Tuesday, July 20, from 10 a.m. to noon.
Bringing women's supports to rural communities: Strait Area Women's Place announces road trip - Toronto Star
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