A Sioux Falls shelter for women and children who have been abused is at risk of shutting down.

The shelter has been running on grants and federal funding since 2000, but those grants are coming to an end. Now the director says the women at the shelter may have to move out.

The Mita Maske Ti Ki shelter, which means "My Sister Friends' House," houses about a dozen women and children who have left abusive homes and are trying to turn their lives around. But with their funding running out at the end of August, those victims of domestic violence could soon lose their sanctuary. 

With a large living area, complete with couches and a TV, the Mita Maske Ti Ki shelter tries to give beaten and battered women a safe place to call home. 

"I don't think this shelter will be appreciated until it is shut down," shelter director Jolana Thompson said.

The shelter has been giving women in Sioux Falls a secure place to live since 2000. For the past few years the shelter has been funded by grants through Project Safe out of Fort Thompson. Now, the director doesn't know if other grants will come through to pick up the $10,000-a-month bill to keep the doors open. 

"We're waiting on other grants to come through but if those don't come through we're basically looking at shutting down at the end of August," Thompson said. 

"And the way federal funding is in this day and age everyone is applying for it and not everyone is getting it," Chris Jongeling with the South Dakota Coalition Against Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault said.

Jongeling says the shelter continues to turn abused women and children away because there just isn't enough space. 

"The need is evident in the fact that the shelter is always full to overflowing and some women and children are turned away because there just isn't room for them," Jongeling said. 

If more funding for the shelter is turned away, even more women and children will need a secure place to stay in Sioux Falls.

Make a donation to the Mita Maske Ti Ki Shelter

Or mail a donation to this address:

Mita Maske Ti Ki
P.O. Box 2141
Sioux Falls, SD 57101