NEWPORT NEWS, Va. (WAVY) — Homeless women will soon have a new option to turn to for long-term assistance in Newport News.

Newport News City Council voted unanimously on Tuesday to approve a conditional use permit for Peninsula Rescue Mission, which runs a men’s shelter downtown, to operate a group home at a vacant office building at 9308 Warwick Boulevard next to the city’s Amtrak station.

The application approved by council includes plans for housing up to 20 women at a time, with 10, two-bed sleeping rooms on the building’s second floor. Peninsula Rescue will have administrative offices on the third floor, with six employees total staffing the group home 24 hours with morning and evening shifts.

To qualify, the women will have to be unaccompanied (with no children).

Newport News resident Debra Jones, who used to work with Newport News Human Services, says that these women are typically older than homeless women with children and “they’re often times much more vulnerable than other homeless groups such as youths and single men.”

The women will also have sign up for a minimum 60-day stay (maximum of two years), when they’ll learn skills and receive other resources to help break the cycle of homelessness, Peninsula Rescue officials say.

“Thousands of men have found a safe haven in our shelters since April of 1966. While with us it costs the city nothing in policing or incarceration or in any other way,” said Peninsula Rescue’s Rev. Lindsay Poteat. “… women make up a significant portion now of the homeless population. We minister to ladies in many ways, we do not currently have a shelter to take them off the street and a place to train them to get back into society and lead productive lives.”

Daniel Ethridge, who owns a nearby business with his wife called the Georgia Peach in Hilton Village, was one of many speakers who came out on Tuesday to speak in favor of the proposal.

He says there’s a real need for homeless services in the area.

“We leave and show up to work every day with the reality of homelessness on the steps of our business, in the alley of business. We know these women’s faces, we see them and there is a genuine need for this group home.”

He says he’s also encouraged how Peninsula Rescue will address long-term needs.

“There are many well-meaning groups who attempt to address homeless by addressing a very felt need: food, water, clothing. And in doing so they attract homeless people to them for a split second. And while the meet a very real felt need, those same people end up back on the street that night.”

The facility won’t accept walk-ins. Instead, the intake process will go via telephone/virtually and in-person in an offsite-location to make sure prospective residents meet criteria for the program and are seeking self-sufficiency training and skills, Peninsula Rescue says.

One speaker at the June 7 meeting of the city’s planning commission, which voted 9-0 to approve the project, said he was concerned by not allowing walk-ins that Peninsula Regional could potential discriminate against people of other backgrounds and religions by screening them out.

Peninsula Regional officials insisted that wouldn’t be the case and that people of other faiths will be accepted, and being a Christian is not criteria for admission. They said they’re not trying to convert people, but the program will be faith-based and include chapel services.

Planning Commission member Timothy Grabowski said he was also concerned that so far Peninsula Regional has not developed a curriculum for the program, which promises education, counseling, training and other services structured from between 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., but says he hopes PRM can quickly create one with oversight from its board of directors.

Member LaMonte Williams added he hopes Peninsula Regional properly vets each of its employees that will be involved with the group home.

Overall, speakers for the facility said it will be in critical in helping the city’s homeless population, specifically the underserved population of unaccompanied homeless women.

“Having done this for many years I’ve noticed that the Rescue Mission has learned more things, to provide for many of the needs that homeless people … they have a desire to help these individuals, our community, said Robert Mallory, a local business owner who’s worked at Peninsula Rescue Mission over the years. “They provide a safe place to get encouragement, to get support, training, counseling, life skills that they need. It’s not just an overnight thing.”

“I do think if there was a group home like this a [homeless woman who I’d see walking on my lunch break] would have a place to go and I wouldn’t have to wonder where she is now. She’d be cared for spiritually and physically,” added resident Angela Moore.

You can read more about the proposal in the city’s agenda packet starting on page 23.