Perth Voice Interactive

A LOCAL Bayswater association is providing free furniture and household goods to survivors of domestic violence.

“We have walked into a place where they had moved three days ago and they haven’t got a fridge, they’ve been living on takeaway food and they were all sleeping on the floor,” says SOS founder Debbie Mason.

“Then we step in. And by the time we leave it’s like they have been living there for 10 years.

“They can never believe that a) we did it and b) they can keep it. It was like watching a 60-minute make-over.”

Starting Over Support (SOS) started two and a half years ago but only became an independent organisation last week.

“We started out through Zona Housen Refuge Association as a project under Positive Pathways,” Ms Mason says.

“They helped me to set it up. I basically contacted them originally and said ‘Is there a need for this service?’ and they went ‘oh hell yeah’. Then it took us six months to get to a stage where we could start.”

SOS has moved into its first warehouse and is in the process of crowdfunding to buy its own truck.

SOS provides everything from blankets, bed sheets and pillows to kettles, vases, sandwich-presses and sofas. Its aim is to fully furnish accommodation for survivors

Ms Mason says the organisation has crowdfunded its first year of rent ($30,000) by selling excess items in carpark markets and through generous donations, but it has to find a more sustainable business model.

“To make it sustainable we obviously have to start getting grant money and donations to keep it going. For us to survive past Christmas we need to actually find money.”

Bayswater councillor Stephanie Coates hopes community groups will step in to provide some extra items like new pillows and cleaning products.

“I hope there will be some champions in the community that will pick this up and say I’m going to collect and bring it here. That’s what I’m hoping for from the local community.”

Ms Mason says she won’t surrender: “This was my baby in the first place, this is my passion. This has become my life’s work, this is what I’ll keep doing, no matter what.”

by MARTA PASCUAL JUANOLA