In addition to Grace Baptist, many other area churches are supporting (the) effort. Trinity Evangelical Presbyterian Church in Cicero has donated $10,000.

When she was struggling with drug addiction and the pain of sexual assault, Debra Person ended up in a Christian shelter for women in Schenectady.

The native Syracusan stayed 10 months and began to turn her life around. She went back to school, eventually earning bachelor’s and master’s degrees in social work.

“They helped me to have self-reliance, to depend on someone greater than myself and help me heal from my pain and go forward,” Person said.

Now she wants to return the favor by opening a seven-bed women’s shelter in Syracuse modeled after the Schenectady program. She plans to open Exodus House at 429 Valley Drive on Syracuse’s South Side later this year.

The vacant house is owned by next-door neighbor Grace Baptist Church, where Person is a member. The church is letting Person use it for the shelter. She has formed a 501(c)3 nonprofit, Exodus 3 Ministries Inc.

Gary Welling, pastor of Grace Baptist and president of the Exodus board, said the house was donated to the church and church leaders were not sure what to do with it until Person came along and shared her vision.

“She’s been there, done that,” Welling said. “She’s an eloquent lady and is living proof there is a way out.”
Read More: http://www.syracuse.com/news/index.ssf/2010/05/a_new_shelter_for_women_exodus.html