Belle Fourche shelter for women vets closes

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BELLE FOURCHE (AP) — A homeless shelter and training facility for women veterans has closed after being open for less than eight months, in part because high construction costs left the facility with crippling debt.

"I think all of us are in tears today," said Emily Wolff, a legal adviser for the Women of War residential training center in Belle Fourche.

The shelter took its first residents in January. It was able to house 28 residents but never had more than eight. It needed at least 18 to qualify for enough reimbursement from the federal Veterans Administration to break even, Wolff said.

The shelter had five residents that had to move elsewhere when it closed Monday.

It cost about $1.2 million to build the shelter, about half of which is still owed. Wolff said that organizers expected to have enough federal money to pay 60 percent of the construction cost, but it only covered about 25 percent.

"That's where we just can't dig ourselves out of it," she said. "It was our financial situation that closed us."

Supporters of the center hope to get enough money to reopen it, Wolff said.

"We're working on keeping the buildings protected," Wolff told the media. "It won't just be abandoned."

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