Women’s shelter reflects on crucial role
Lewis House in Eagan was begun 30 years ago as a disbelief about domestic abuse began to fade.
By PETER COX, Special to the Star Tribune
Last summer, a woman in her 20s asked Mary Ajax, who heads the Lewis House women’s shelter in Eagan, to coffee.
The woman had stayed at the shelter when she was 5, and wanted to tell Ajax about a significant moment.
“She said, ‘I remember being at the kitchen table and being safe, just feeling like we weren’t going to have to run and hide and lock ourselves in the bathroom, because that’s what we’d have to do at home,’” Ajax said. “For the first time in her life, she’d felt safe.”
Such stories have dotted the 30-year life of the shelter for battered women.
In January, the Community Action Council, which runs the Lewis House, celebrated those 30 years of service.
The house opened its doors in 1979 in a refurbished single-family home. It was named after Sen. B. Robert Lewis, who had written bills aimed at preventing domestic violence.
“We quickly outgrew that, and there wasn’t another facility that would work for us in our area,” Ajax said. So they built their own.
In 1985, the council built a new Lewis House.
Ajax had been working with the council since 1975. In her first few years, abuse was viewed as something that needed to be kept secret and behind closed doors. Ajax remembers people being skeptical of the need for her job.
“When I first started out, people looked at me and said, ‘What are you talking about?’” Ajax said. “‘We don’t know anyone in an abusive relationship.’ Therapists would say that; county people would say that.”
The year 1979 was pivotal: Legislators created a law to allow police to arrest domestic assault suspects as they arrest for other crimes; prior to that officers had to witness the abuse. An order-for-protection law was passed. Lewis House opened.
Since those early days, the Lewis House has helped more than 60,000 women and added another location in Hastings. Together, the two houses can shelter more than 40 people at a time.
Lewis House shelters about 500 women a year and serves three times as many through outreach programs, said Doreen L’Allier, director of youth advocacy at the council.
“I meet women who I helped in the Lewis House 16 years ago,” she said. “They want to give back or volunteer. For me, the most fulfilling part is when we are able to welcome these women back.”
For local law enforcement, the shelter is an option the justice system can’t provide.
Said Lakeville Police Chief Tom Vonhof: “It’s an unheralded service that our community has had for so many years. One of those organizations that quietly works in the background, by making things much better for people that are victimized.”
Peter Cox is a St. Paul freelance writer.
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