Safe Shelter acquires site, needs building funds

By John Howell
Batesville Safe Shelter has begun its second phase toward a goal to establish a safe, secure place for victims of domestic violence, Pastor Jake Julian said last week, speaking at the Rotary Club’s noon Tuesday meeting.
After four years, “we have finally this past month achieved our first phase of this project,” Julian said, “which was to secure a place to put it. Hosanna Family Worship Center has come forward and offered some of their land to use, and that is a huge, huge blessing.”
Hosanna Family Worship Center is located on 23 acres in the southwest quadrant of the intersection of Interstate 55 and Hentz Road in Pope, according to Julian. The worship center has agreed to lease two acres to Batesville Safe Shelter for ten years for one dollar annually, the pastor said.
“That was a huge relief because that money that’s sitting there that we have raised with our fund-raisers is now available to be turned toward construction of a building,” Julian said. “That’s phase two and that’s where we’re at. We’re starting a capital campaign to raise about $75,000.”
Batesville Safe Shelter and the Batesville Boys and Girls Club will present on Friday, November 4 an original play specially written and produced for the occasion by Brandon McMillon. Co-sponsors are Bim Bam Burgers and Sardis District Baptist Association. “These 4 Walls” focuses on domestic violence, wasted teen talent, parental neglect, drug abuse and attempted rape and will be presented at 7 p.m. At the Batesville Civic Center.
“We started this project in 2012, and it’s been a slow crawl,” Julian said. At least two prior attempts to have sites approved for the shelter’s location have been thwarted by obejcetions of residents who live near the sites.
Julian is a Certified Pastoral Counselor who came to Batesville in 2009 as hospital chaplain. He said that he soon encountered victims of domestic violence who were treated in the emergency room and then had no place to go other than to return to the site where the abuse occurred.
“I felt very frustrated when there was a need to go someplace safe, and there was no place to take her,” he said. The nearest shelters to Panola County are in Tupelo and DeSoto County, he said.
“Domestic violence is the leading cause of injury to women exceeding injuries caused by muggings, stranger rapes and automobile accidents combined,” Julian said. “The most dangerous call police officers have to answer — more police officers die on these calls than any other death combined,” he continued.
The pastor said that he tracks the number of local cases of domestic violence through emergency room records and the reports of the police and sheriff’s departments published in The Panolian.
“We average four to seven in Panola County every week,” Julian said. “What concerns me is it’s an iceberg; when you’ve got this much above water you’ve got a whole bunch more underneath.”
Batesville Safe Shelter is intended to serve residents of Panola and surrounding counties, according to Julian.
The goal of the November 4 play is to sell 1,500 tickets at $20. Proceeds will be divided equally between Batesville Safe Shelter and the Boys and Girls Club.
For tickets contact Julian at 662-609-5850.
Batesville Safe Shelter will also raise funds with its annual Christmas Bazaar on November ?? At the VFW building on Highway 51 South.