Bethpage domestic violence shelter Safe Center LI to close, executive director says

Financially troubled Safe Center LI, which runs Nassau County’s only domestic violence shelter, will end its services Friday.

In a statement Tuesday afternoon announcing the closure, executive director Joshua Hanson said other services set to close include the advocacy center that helps child abuse prosecutions, a crisis intervention hotline and Safe Center’s advocate response program, which sends a trained volunteer to emergency rooms to comfort survivors of rape, sexual assault and domestic violence.

“Over the past several months, we have worked closely with Nassau County to identify a partner to continue these critical services,” Hanson said in the statement. “However, at this time, we are not aware of any confirmed plan to ensure continuity, and unfortunately, The Safe Center cannot sustain operations beyond this date.”

Future plans unclear

It was unclear what plans Nassau officials might have to continue any of the Bethpage nonprofit’s work.

“The not for profit that was assisting the county in operating the safe center has not lived up to the high standards that Nassau County demands,” said Chris Boyle, a spokesperson for County Executive Bruce Blakeman, in an emailed statement.

“County Executive Blakeman has put together a committee that will make sure that the SAFE center is a model of excellence.”

Boyle did not make any county officials available for an interview and did not answer emailed questions about the immediate future for victim services in Nassau County.

In a story Tuesday, Newsday reported, citing Hanson, that Safe Center could close by the end of March. Hanson’s statement, sent Tuesday afternoon, did not explain the accelerated timeline, and he did not respond to a request for comment.

Concern for victims

Any interruption of services would be an immediate concern for residents of the domestic violence shelter. Hanson said last week that 10 people were living there.

Active child abuse cases will also be affected, said Nicole Turso, a spokesperson for Nassau District Attorney Anne Donnelly, in a statement.

“This closure will have an adverse effect on our prosecutions involving children and their families, while stripping away a crucial, centralized resource for supportive services, making an already unimaginably difficult set of circumstances even harder for victims of crime,” she said.

In an interview, Nassau County Legis. Seth Koslow (D-Merrick), a former Queens prosecutor who in January announced a run for county executive, said the impending closure could have been avoided with better county planning.

“This was a failure of leadership in Nassau to ensure the safety of these children who have been victimized once and are now being victimized again by the Blakeman administration,” he said in an interview. “This wasn’t something that just fell out of the heavens — people saw this coming.”

Worsening finances

Hanson has said in interviews that he warned high-ranking county officials last fall that Safe Center’s worsening finances could impact operations. Newsday has previously reported that Safe Center could close without a successor and that Safe Center’s plan to hand off operations to a Manhattan-based nonprofit that would have acquired some of its assets appeared to have foundered.

That plan hinged on the approval of county officials who would have reassigned contacts for Safe Center’s core services to Safe Horizon, the nation’s largest nonprofit provider of victim services.

Hanson and Safe Horizon CEO Liz Roberts said in interviews that they had support last fall from Department of Social Services Commissioner Jose Lopez and Deputy County Executive for Health and Human Services Anissa Moore. But the county on Feb. 26 issued a request for interest for nonprofits to provide a range of victim services.

Leaders of several nonprofits have said they were asked to make presentations for county officials at the county’s police training facility.

Roberts said Tuesday that her organization had had no communication from the county since early last week and that, based on conversations with other nonprofits still making presentations, the county did not appear to have decided where to reassign contracts for victim services. Nassau provided $2.9 million of Safe Center’s $7.7 million in revenue in 2023, according to that organization’s latest published audited financial statement.

Core operations

Roberts has said Safe Horizon had agreed to take over all of Safe Center’s core operations. “We know exactly what to do. We’ve already made offer letters to staff and done background checks.”

Neela Mukherjee Lockel, president and CEO of Garden City-based EAC Network, which runs Suffolk County’s Child Advocacy Center with locations in Riverhead and Central Islip, said Monday that her organization had responded to Nassau’s request for information with a Feb. 25 presentation about their work.

In addition to the advocacy center, the network provides services to minors who are victims of human trafficking, Mukherjee said. County officials also asked about a network hotline and domestic violence and legal services, she said.

“We can take on any and all of it, but we’re also happy to work in partnership with another entity,” Mukherjee said.

Sarah Brewster, chief director of services and operations for Circulo De La Hispanidad, a community agency whose work includes domestic violence and victim services, said she had also been asked to present in late February before county officials about her agency’s work.

She said she had gotten little information from the county or from Safe Center. “We would like to have a coordinated community response,” she said. “This is a community problem, not just an agency problem.”