Women's Business Council to Tour the Lotus House

Description

The Women's Business Council of the Miami Beach Chamber of Commerce will be touring the Lotus House
 

The Lotus House is a unique resource center and residential facility serving homeless women and infants in the heart of the historic African American district of Overtown, Miami, an area suffering from extreme poverty in one of the poorest large cities in the United States. Lotus House provides free transitional housing and wrap around support services with access to a wide range of resources to approximately 130 women and infants annually. With a holistic, gender specific and innovative format, Lotus House seeks to empower women to improve the quality of their lives on every level, achieve greater self sufficiency and transition to permanent homes off the streets.

Lotus House serves women who are homeless, whether due to domestic violence, untreated medical or mental illness, disability or economic reasons. The facility houses up to 50 women and children at a time and includes a special maternity wing for women who are homeless and pregnant and their infants. Women come to Lotus House through referrals from homeless outreach, shelters, safe houses, rehab centers, prisons, hospitals and courts, as well as the streets. For many, it is a shelter of last resort, as temporary shelters do not afford them an opportunity to address untreated medical and mental illnesses, obtain work or benefits, and save the funds needed to truly break the cycle of homelessness.