DALLAS - The numbers are sobering - 20,000 calls a year to Dallas Police from women feeling threatened by their husbands or boyfriends.
What's more, only a fraction of those have a safe place to go.
Shatavia Roberts and her two young children are homeless, hungry, out late on the streets and afraid.
Yet somehow she still considers herself fortunate.
"I have not had to sleep outside, I have not had my kids taken from me," said Roberts. "I'm hoping that somewhere I can get some help soon."
And at least for now, she has found that help in Debra Nixon-Bowles.
Bowles, who operates Women Called Moses Coalition, a domestic violence outreach organization, has just learned of Shatavia's situation.
Roberts is estranged from her family, was threatened at gunpoint by a boyfriend and turned away for the past several nights by every family violence shelter in town.
"And I think it's really sad," said Bowles. "This is Domestic Violence Awareness month and here it is we tell these women to leave and they have no where to go and they become homeless."
Bowles has raised enough money to put Shatavia and her children in a hotel for the night.
After all, there are only 150 beds for battered women and children in Dallas.
"The shelters are dancing as fast as they can," said Jan Edgar Langbein, executive Director of the Genesis Women's Shelter. She says the lack of beds in Dallas is no secret.
She and the 500 volunteers from the Genesis Alliance are working hard to raise more money but she says it takes much more.
"We all have to roll up our sleeves, it can't just be the shelters or police," said Langbein.
Now, for Shatavia and her children, one woman, Debra Nixon-Bowles has rolled up her sleeves, which is fortunate for one young mother on this one night, who will try not to worry about tomorrow.
"I know there are a lot of single mothers out there," said Roberts. "It's not only my situation and to be in a dangerous environment with your children, and to be told no, it's like what other option do you have?"
E-mail: bshipp@wfaa.com
