Food for Thought Blog
Agency Spotlight: Safe Haven Youth Services
August 9th, 2024In the Community, Agencies
Safe Haven Youth Services, operated by Starling Community Services, provides crisis, respite, and life launch services to youth aged 12 to 18 living in Waterloo region. With the recent addition of six new beds, Safe Haven can now provide shelter and support for up to 16 youth at one time.
At Safe Haven, youth who are experiencing a crisis are given a safe place to stay through their Crisis Services program. Staff help youth develop a resolution so they can return home or find an alternative safe place to live.
Safe Haven’s Respite Services program provides one- and two-night stays to youth who are experiencing difficulties within their home environments and need a temporary break. These pre-planned short-term stays help reduce the amount of crisis occurring within the home while the youth is on the waitlist for or accessing a treatment program, or while the youth is transitioning home from a treatment or community program.
For youth who have accessed Crisis Services and are looking for long-term housing, Safe Haven’s Life Launch Services program offers shelter and support. Staff help youth develop positive life and social skills, find suitable housing options, and connect them with other community resources.
“Safe Haven Youth Services strives to provide every youth with the resources and support necessary to address their immediate crisis and to build the skills required to prevent reoccurrence,” says Lindsey White, the manager at Safe Haven.
Safe Haven is one of 54 organizations with the Community Food Assistance Network that receive food support from The Food Bank of Waterloo Region. The Food Bank provides a variety of fresh and frozen food to Safe Haven, as well as grocery gift cards that they use to buy non-perishable food. This support from The Food Bank helps Safe Haven to provide youth accessing their services with breakfasts, lunches, dinners, and snacks every day of the week.
“We provide a wide range of meals, depending on the youth’s individual cultural and religious needs,” Lindsey explains. “Meals also meet the needs of youth with allergies or food intolerances.”
In addition to having access to healthy and nutritious meals and snacks, youth are also given the opportunity to develop skills in cooking, meal preparation, budgeting, and meal planning.
“On a weekly basis, a cultural meal is prepared with a programming component attached to support youth’s cultural awareness,” Lindsey says. “The youth love working with staff in the kitchen and each week, the youth develop the meal plan with support from staff. Youth accompany staff on grocery store trips and work on budgeting, including what it may look like when they live independently and may need to supplement their food from The Food Bank.”
Lindsey notes just how impactful it is for these youth to have food readily available to them.
“A large percentage of our youth have experienced food insecurity,” she says. “Being able to take the worry of food insecurity away offers opportunities to help youth strive. They don’t need to worry about where their next meal will come from.”
If you’d like to help The Food Bank support Network partners like Safe Haven, visit our Get Involved section on our website to learn more about donating food, funds, or time. To learn more about Safe Haven, visit starlingcs.ca/housing/safe-haven-youth-services.