April is National Fair Housing Month! Fair housing is a growing need and concern within all communities. This is especially true for the victim/survivors that WRAP works with. WoMen’s Rural Advocacy Programs, Inc. (WRAP) provides advocacy for victim/survivors of domestic abuse and sex trafficking/exploitation in Lincoln, Lyon, Redwood, and Yellow Medicine Counties. Housing is a very significant part of a victim/ survivor feeling safe. Finding this housing has become increasingly difficult, especially in our rural areas. Oftentimes, victim/survivors will have many barriers they must overcome in order to secure housing. Some of these barriers include but are not limited to rent deposit, poor or no credit history, and/or poor or no rental history. Some barriers that are common in rural areas more specifically include the reputation of victim/survivors, their abusers, or their families, limited landlords that own a large amount of property in a town, and limited cultur-al diversity within the rural communities. These barriers are often due to the domestic violence or trafficking/exploitation a victim has gone through. Imagine a relationship where the abusive partner has control of the money (even the money earned by the victim from the victim’s work), does not allow the victim to have a credit card or loan, and does not allow the victim’s name to be on any rental or mortgage documents. The victim would have very little funds, no credit history, and no documentable housing history. The barriers for the victim in this situation would be very hard to overcome.

The majority of my instructors in writer graduate school were not objectively famous. One of them was, though: - major-literary-prize, in-airport-bookstores, regular-dinners-with-the-President (of the US, not the college) - famous. She was e a lovely person, but we were all terrified to sit in her presence.