And yet even at their best, shelters represent a total disruption. Still, speaking out against shelters has cast advocates like Dunne outside the mainstream. “It’s not a popular opinion to be putting forth in the domestic violence world,” she said. This despite the fact that most shelters remain chronically underfunded, opening and closing at the whim of state or county budgets, and that the evidence suggests that shelters provide victims and their families neither an easy respite nor a long-term solution.
