The Family Place Shelters and More

One in three Texas women are victims of domestic violence and abuse. Mimi Sterling, CEO of the Family Place in Dallas lets us know that the Family Place is where abuse stops. With shelters and so much more, the Family Place provides everything needed to help victims become survivors. Please check out their story and share it with everyone you know.

Episode Transcript

(00:09):
Welcome to Advocacy in Motion. I'myour host, Tommy Finn, and we're
here each week to give a visionand a voice to nonprofit organizations and individuals
making a difference in our community.And before I introduce our guest today,
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(01:15):
solution that will help with the environmentand save you money. Shop now on
Amazon or at home deepot dot Com. I want to Do is our guest
today. She is Mimi Sterling.She is a CEO of The Family Place.
Welcome, Thanks Tommy, nice tobe here. Tell us about the
Family Place, what do you doand how's your organized? So The Family
Place is the largest service provider tosurvivors of domestic violence in Texas. We

(01:41):
are celebrating our forty five anniversary thisyear. So we've been in business since
nineteen seventy eight, and we havecomprehensive services that start in the middle and
high school ages with a prevention programthrough education and awareness of healthy relationship.
We have three shelters across the DFWarea, one in East Dallas, one

(02:06):
in the Medical District, and oneactually serving men and children in the Oak
Cliff area. And I specifically bringthat up because we are a service provider,
one of two in the entire UnitedStates that serves men and children.
Not everybody believes that men can bevictimized by domestic violence, and we know

(02:28):
that they can, so we havea shelter that is often full with men
and their children. We also havethree counseling centers, a daycare k through
two school medical clinics, we reallyare a full service organization. Something else
that's a little bit different about us. We also work with offenders and batters,

(02:49):
so we have two programs that servefamilies in that stage. So we
have a batter's Intervention and Prevention program, which is a program helps batters learn
appropriate behavior and help change their behavior. We call it our rehabilitation program.
And then we also have a supervisedvisitation center. And so if a family

(03:13):
is still in the court system andboth parents still have access to visitation with
children, but it's not quite safeto do it alone, we provide a
visitation monitoring service in our very childcentric, family friendly, warm, bright
environment so that the kids are verysafe while they visit their non custodial parent.

(03:36):
And there are many more programs involved, but just a quick snapshot that
we're very comprehensive in our services fromprevention to emergency shelter work, counseling all
the way to the rehabilitation of theoffender. Yeah, our mission here is
to give a voice to our organizationsmaking a difference in the community. And
I don't know of anyone making moreimportant contributions to the community in the family

(04:00):
place. So we all really appreciatethat, and can you share a little
advice about people wanting to get helpfrom you? How does that work?
Sure? So one of the thingsthat we often like to remind people of
is the incredible stats around domestic violence. So one in four women in the
United States and one in seven menexperienced domestic violence at one point in their

(04:25):
life, and the numbers actually areincreased in Texas, so it's one in
three women in Texas. So Ioften say, when I'm in a large
room of people, if they're threehundred people in the room, one hundred,
if they're all women, probably onehundred of those women at one point
have experienced domestic violence. And itcomes to life in several ways. So

(04:46):
there's physical abuse, which we caneasily understand, hitting, strangulation, punching,
the things that you can physically feeland physically see. It also comes
to life in financial abuse and emotionalabuse, and that those tend to be
lesser understood, and so I givea little bit more information around those so

(05:08):
that people can understand that this typeof abuse happens on every street, in
every neighborhood. It is not aproblem that lives somewhere else. Tommy it's
on your street, it's on mystreet. So I think awareness is really
important. And how can you helpsomebody, Well, the key is to
provide support but not too much advice. And so the idea would be and

(05:31):
we have a whole page of howto support a friend on our website which
is family place dot org. PleaseI encourage people to come to our website
and check it out. There's signsof abuse and then there are ways to
help a friend. Being a goodfriend is saying something like I'm always here
for you if you need me,or I'm not quite sure what's going on,

(05:56):
but I know that there's help outthere. And so by providing our
phone number, which is a twentyfour seven three sixty five hot line,
it's two one four nine four oneone nine nine one and that can be
accessed nationwide, open to anybody callingfor help. That's a really helpful step
to providing people who may be ina situation that needing help, just knowing

(06:19):
that help is available. One inthree women. That's a staggering number.
Yeah, that's that's something that I'venever thought it was that. Yeah,
renounced and the numbers are very underreported. So that number is projections and assume

(06:40):
that's kind of the stats that TCFE, so the Texas the Council on Family
Violence publishes. But if you lookat police reports and call volume to nine
one one, you know the numbersare much lower than that. The numbers
are high, but they're not onethird of our female population in Dallas,
And so that means that there area lot of people suffer ring at home

(07:00):
in silence and don't either know thattheir service is available or haven't quite figured
out how to access the services theymay need. Tell us about your role,
your CEO, How did you cometo a family place and sure,
so it's a pretty magical journey.I have been there almost two years,
so I'm looking forward to celebrating myanniversary here in a couple of weeks.

(07:21):
My background is communications and storytelling andmarketing, and my most recent role I
was head of Environmental Social Governance andBelonging, which is diversity, equity inclusion
work at Neiman Marcus. So Ihad been there eight years and had worked
in the communications space event space,but also I was in charge of the

(07:45):
Neiman Marcus Foundation. So I havea lot of nonprofit volunteer work in my
history. I always like to throwin that I was head of community service
in high school, which it wasa very proud role for me to have,
and I've always been involved in certainnonprofits, but at Neiman Marcus,
being in charge of the Neiman MarcusFoundation and giving money to different nonprofits allowed

(08:07):
me to really understand how nonprofits worktheir missions, how they fundraise, and
really putting a critical eye on impact. So the job for the family Place
was coming available based on the formerCEO of thirty years retiring, and I
had a couple of different people mentioned, Oh, there's this amazing job,

(08:28):
you should look into it, andI thought to myself, I don't know,
I don't know why they think I'mthe person, you know kind of
you know, a humble approach,I guess, And as I spoke to
a mentor of mine and then afriend of mine, both who had recommended
the job, I realized that itwas such a magical opportunity and gift to

(08:50):
take my more than twenty year corporatecareer and use all the different levels and
skills and relationships that I had builtover time to make a real difference.
And so while it looks like toomany I get this question multiple times a
week. It looks like a bigshift and a big jump. A lot

(09:11):
of the work is the same,there's new new pieces of the job.
Of course, a lot of thework is the same. But it is
such an honor to be able tohave my focus, energy, time,
passion for work be translated so directlyin actual impact, directly supporting people.
So I just feel like it's suchan honor and a gift to be considered

(09:35):
for the role and now have thisrole. I'm incredibly dedicated, So that's
amazing. That's really wonderful. Tellus about your staff, volunteer staff,
how are you structured there? Soone of the things that my chairman,
so my boss chairman of our boardloves to remind people is we are budgeted
for two hundred and fifty employees.So a little known fact is we are

(09:58):
a huge, huge nonprofit and weare a big employer in the DFW area.
We run about a seventeen million dollarbudget, so that's give or take,
you can understand kind of the size. In twenty twenty two, we
served more than nineteen thousand different individualsunduplicated. So our employees, we have
all different roles from case managers andcounselors, so licensed counselors to operation staff

(10:28):
it people, marketing, people,fundraisers. We have a finance team,
and our finance team may look likeany businesses finance team. We have a
CFO and a senior director of accounting, so we have very similar operations to
any other business marketing, PR,accounting, HRX. We call it people

(10:48):
services. But then our core business, our frontline staff are those that are
highly trained and highly skilled at helpingpeople who have experienced different forms of domestic
violence. It's we have a verydiverse employee population, and I will tell
you some of my very very favoritedays are our town halls when we all

(11:09):
come together and I can look acrossthe sea of very dedicated and passionate people
who whose life work is to reallyhelp people that are in sometimes their most
vulnerable state. Now we'll put thisup on the screen and we'll talk about
it many times. But if somebodywants to get involved, would like to
come volunteer or come to work foryou, how would they get in touch

(11:30):
with me? Thank you great question. So if you are in need of
services, call our twenty four seventhree sixty five hotline SO two one four
nine four one one nine nine one. If you'd like to volunteer, donate,
get involved, go on our websiteso family Place dot org and there's
a volunteer tab. You fill outa quick little application, someone will come,

(11:52):
we'll follow up with you, andthen there's also a page to donate,
which is you know, for thoseof you that know how nonprofits work,
that is how we function through donations, which are incredibly important. I
know the mission of fan Place isimportant to you. Tell us about that.
Yes, you're so sure, passionate. So our mission is communities free

(12:13):
from domestic violence, and we workedas our vision, and we worked tirelessly,
not only in a lot of peoplethink that we're just a shelter,
so I reinforce the fact that yeswe are three shelters, but that we
have all these wraparound services to reallymake sure that anyone from any background,

(12:33):
in any circumstance experiencing domestic violence canreceive some form of life saving, life
changing services that will help them reacha brighter future. And that may be
resume writing, job interview skills,and job placement. We have a whole
job placement program as well. Whatis your vision moving forward for the family

(12:56):
place. So when I began veryoptimistically two years ago, my vision was
personally, my vision was to workmyself out of a job. So I
think we have a few more yearsto do that before we get there.
Unfortunately, because of the numbers ofdomestic violence do continue to rise. So
we as an agency are incredibly focusedon education and prevention, and we're working

(13:20):
very closely with the City of Dallasand also DISD to continue to expand our
programs in the education space. Educatingand teaching younger people what healthy relationships look
like actually breaks the cycle of violence. So what is my vision. My
vision is communities free from violence domesticviolence, but that comes to life through

(13:43):
a lot more investment in education andworking with our younger generations so that they
know not to perpetrate domestic violence andthey also learn to identify it so that
they can get out of the relationshipif they are experiencing it. Really break
the cycle. And you mentioned youwork with different groups and organizations. What
about law enforcement? That's it?Yes, absolutely so we do have a

(14:07):
longstanding, very deep relationship with DPD. We also work with Irving p D
and all the different police departments andsheriff departments in our areas. So we
actually have a very interesting high riskprogram that is specifically focused on Dallas highest
risk DV survivors. So through thispartnership, we have a dedicated team who

(14:35):
work very closely with the police department, where if there is someone in an
extreme domestic violence scenario that is veryvery dangerous, the police department, they
know exactly where we are. Theyactually just show up with that person and
we're able to accommodate that person atany time. We also have this team
that go around sometimes with police officersand make home as we know some of

(15:01):
the when there's been a couple nineone one calls and we know that person
may be in very big danger,we're able to go and proactively provide services.
Let me take another little break hereto introduce one of our other sponsors
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(15:22):
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(16:07):
session. All right, you saidyou have you have shelters around you work
with that. What is Can youshare some stories, some stories with us
about the success and how how itworks? Are sure? Yeah? Some

(16:29):
clan stories yea, so we haveseveral. One recently was a gentleman who
had come into our care. Hehad experienced domestic violence in his relationship at
home and came to our men's shelter. He had called the hotline and the
hotline was able to place him inour Men's shelter. And he did not

(16:49):
have a job at the time,but was very interested in helping others and
was interested in the medical field,and we have a partnership with this medical
organization. It's a training organization,and it's a program where you know,
you get your basic you know,nursing skills polished up. And so we

(17:12):
were able to specifically fundraise for ascholarship for this gentleman through this program.
They because we do have this partnership, they were able to offer him a
payment plan versus paying it all upfront, so he himself is invested in
a portion, and then the familyplace raised the other portion, so he

(17:33):
personally is invested as well. Andhis mission personally is to learn skills that
then can translate into him helping othersin the future. And I'm happy to
report that three months into the programhe has his own apartment, he has
savings, and he has this programand a side job. So you know,
he came to us with not alot of hope and not a lot

(17:56):
of optimism for what we call hisbright future that we know exists for him
through programs and counseling and support.But as he continues his counseling, he's
on the road to a much brighterfuture. He actually recently wrote us a
thank you note and it was soheartfelt. I don't have it right in

(18:18):
front of me, but said somethinglike the Family Place was a gift from
God for him, and that hejust didn't realize that there were places that
could offer services because he didn't reallyunderstand what he was going through and didn't
know the help that he needed.And so he also has offered that as
he continues his journey, he wouldlove to come back and talk to our
employees about the impact they made.He would love to talk to our board

(18:42):
about the impact that the Family Placehas made. So it's just a heartwarming
story of someone who was in sucha dangerous physical position to come out of
it, have the courage to comeout of it, and then be so
open and able to move forward.So that's just one example. I can

(19:02):
give a couple more, but that'sone of example. I'm sure that's one
of many many success stories and examsexactly all nonprofits have to look at fundraising.
Yes, Tommy, yes we do. Thank you for There is a
balance between your mission and being ableto pay for your mission. Yes,
a very delicate balance, it is, It very much is. But how

(19:25):
can people help fun? What doyou have? You have events coming up?
What do you have coming up thatwe could help with? Thank you?
So we have lots of ways toget involved, and whether it's a
volunteer opportunity with your company or withyour family, or is an individual or
your sorority sisters or you know,your book club. We welcome volunteers of
all shapes and sizes of groups orindividuals. So that also can be found

(19:48):
on our website family place dot org. We're always fundraising and how do we
do that? Excuse me? Ithink that was your question. So we
have a couple of events coming up, is you know, which are very
exciting. So on October tenth,we will host the Texas Trailblazer Awards Luncheon.
And not only are we extremely excitedabout hosting Brooke Shields, the brook

(20:12):
Shields. Somebody asked me recently,like the brook Shields, and I was
like, yes, I think there'sonly one, but it's really the one,
the brook Shields. And so she'sgoing to come and talk to us
about her journey through her career,which has some interesting plot twists for those
of you that haven't seen her Netflixshow, it's it's very eye opening what

(20:33):
she went through. And we willalso be honoring the Chief of Police and
Representative Victoria niave Creato, who havemade an very important step forward in legislation
that allows the public to access aviolent offenders regist registry which is free.

(20:56):
So similar to a sex offender registrywhich has been free for a while,
this will be a violent offender.So why is that helpful? Basically,
if you're going to pursue a newrelationship with someone and you want to do
a quick background check, you nowwill be able to at no cost.
So we're moving that financial barrier.So that luncheon will also honor Mary Kay

(21:18):
and the new CEO, Ryan Rodgers. They have committed and given over the
last sixty plus years I think sixtyfive years ninety two million dollars to domestic
violence globally. So Mary Kay isa huge supporter of not only the Family
Place, but of domestic violence organizationsglobally. So this is a luncheon we
will have an amazing in engaging conversationwith Brookshields, will be honoring people who

(21:42):
have made amazing impact in the domesticviolence space. And you can purchase tickets
at Family Place dot org. Sothat's a get dressed up on October tenth
and come have kind of lunch forour mission. We also have something really
fun in the fall. I thinkhopefully most of your listeners have heard of
Partner's Card. Have you heard ofPartner's Card time with CBS for many years?

(22:03):
Okay, okay, and perhaps yourwife has heard of Partner's Card and
your family. So Partner's Card isa seventy five dollars card that you purchase
directly from the Family Place again familyPlace dot org and those cards go on
sale October first, and with thepurchase of the seventy five dollar card,
you have access to a twenty percentdiscount across seven hundred and fifty retailers and

(22:32):
ten percent off restaurants. So itis rapidly expanding and we are able to
provide more than thirteen thousand shelter nightsbased on that card fundraising. So we
sell approximately thirteen thousand of those cards, and our goals continue to go up
as our funds fundraising goes up.So Partner's Card is a way to kind

(22:53):
of shop retail for a cause.I would say it's also a great way
to get a jumps on the holidayshopping a lot of it's so it runs
October twenty seventh to November fourth,so it's a Friday to the following Sunday.
If you haven't experienced partners card,I would say in the Dallas specific

(23:14):
area. So whether it's North ParkCenter, Highland Park Village, et cetera,
Galleria, those are some of ourbiggest partners. It is a sport.
It is like kind of a BlackFriday type of experience. And we
are so honored that this program isnow thirty one years strong. I wasn't
going to say thirty one years old, but thirty one years strong, and

(23:37):
we're growing. Last year in twentytwenty two, we had the largest year
ever and the program grows one pointthree million dollars. So I make chists
familiar with it. For my days, it's CBS, Yes Radio, and
we were mostly focused on the restaurantside of it, which was terrific.
Yeah deal, I mean there's somany great restaurants and so many great restaurants,
and it's good here that has expandedso much into the retail side going

(24:00):
forwards showing I know you, Iknow you mentioned Tommy Richardson, so we
are actively expanding also into McKinney RichardsonFrisco and South Lake and Fort Worth,
so we continue to expand, andI would just put a little plug out
there. If you're a retailer orbusiness owner and you want to have your

(24:21):
products fly off the shelf, becauseyou will have so many customers and we
have multiple testimonials, please let usknow on family place dot org because we
are continuously on boarding and recruiting newretailers and restaurants all the time. Okay,
I might have one for you andone of our sponsors here, thank
you about that, and yeah,thank you so much. Okay, if

(24:41):
anyway other people can get involved withthe family plafe, I know. Yeah,
so if time or treasure is notyour thing, right, if you
don't have time to volunteer and youdon't necessarily have money to give, we
always accept product donations. So weare always looking for pipers, pantry style

(25:02):
goods like peanut, butter, cereal, mac and cheese, shelf stable items.
So there's always a way to doa pantry drive. There's a way
to clean out your closet. Wehave a resale store. We're always accepting
gently used we don't you know,we want things in good condition, but

(25:22):
gently used housewares and clothing items formen, women, and children of all
sizes. So our clients are ableto shop in our store. They're given
a gift card and they come andthey shop at no charge. But all
of us can shop at our resalestore. And it was just renovated.
It has a beautiful fresh coat ofpurple paint. Purple is the color for
domestic violence, and so there arelots of ways of getting involved. We

(25:47):
also have the opportunity through volunteering toserve meals at some of our shelters.
So certain Knights of the week,we have different groups that come, whether
it's a volunteer group or like aJunior League or a YMSL or Jack and
Jill, they come and serve mealsand do other types of volunteer projects.
But volunteering can also mean cleaning outyour closet for the season change hopefully there's

(26:10):
a season change ahead of us,and donating those clothing items which can really
turn into valuable either product direct toclients or sales for us that then fund
our programs. Lots of ways toget involved. Where is the store,
So it's in the northwest corridor ofDallas near marsh Okay, yep, and
you can find that on the website. You can just google family Place resale

(26:34):
store and it will come up withhours of operation, hours of donation.
So it's not we don't always receivedonations. There's certain days and certain times,
and yes, it is a rightup there. I think it's Walnut
Hill and marsh Okay, well,we've talked about a lot of things.
Yeah, what if I miss Whatis something that you really want our audience

(26:56):
to know that we haven't talked aboutthat they should know. I think one
of the key things that's important foreveryone to know is that number one,
domestic violence happens everywhere. And ifwe all have a little bit more awareness
after today's show, I will feellike that is a success. So if
we all realize that one in threewomen in Texas experienced domestic violence and that

(27:18):
we all have a role in helpingour community members live a safer life,
that will be an incredible win forus. I think it's also important to
recognize that both men and women experienceddomestic violence and that it is something that
happens on every street in every community, across every area of business and of

(27:41):
social status, of immigration status,etc. So just that general awareness.
I think the key second piece iseveryone can help, whether it's cleaning out
your closet, donating an hour volunteertime, or coming to our events and
buying tickets to come see Brookshields tellher Story, or a partner's card for
seventy five dollars. There is aneasy way to get involved, and so

(28:03):
we do encourage you know, allof your listeners, thank you for tuning
in today, but help us withour mission. Go on our website make
a donation. We also have NorthTexas Giving Day coming up. Are you
familiar with North Texas Giving Day?So North Texas Giving Day starts in September.
They it will run September first throughI believe September twenty feet or twenty

(28:25):
second, and we have a verybig goal of one hundred and twenty thousand
dollars this year, so that isalso a great way to give. Just
google North Texas Giving Day and typein the family place and we will be
accepting of all donations. That's wonderful. I've learned so much today that I
didn't know and I hope you knowwe are able to share that with our

(28:45):
listeners. Thank you. I wantto thank our sponsors for making responsible Paranah
Haven and for Niagara Conservation, andthank you for being here. And sure
I appreciate the opportunity. It's beengreat. Thank you so much. All Right,