Why Did We Start Nisa Homes?

At National Zakat Foundation, our aim is to provide the Muslim community with an end-to-end Zakat service in order to establish a self-sufficient Canadian Muslim community. Self-sufficiency would solve many of our problems and that is what we are trying to accomplish with our efforts in the collection and distribution of Zakat. However, after establishing and commencing operations in 2013, we noticed a recurring trend in the applicants for Zakat; they were mostly single mothers.

As stated previously, our goal at NZF is to not just provide the Muslim community with Zakat, but also, to facilitate the establishment of a self-sufficient Muslim community. For many of these single mothers, lack of funds wasn’t the only issue, there were many other bigger issues that needed to be tackled that required more time and a safe space. We needed a proper, more sustainable solution for these mothers, many of whom were homeless (or on the verge of homelessness), victims of domestic abuse or sexual violence, or just trying to escape from unimaginable, difficult circumstances. These sisters needed more than just financial assistance, and so, the idea of Nisa Homes was proposed.

Before taking any steps though, we needed to research three aspects of establishing a transitional home:

1. Is there actually a need?
2. How feasible is this project?
3. How are transitional homes run?

In order to research the “need” factor, a group of brothers and sisters from Mercy Mission took it upon themselves to conduct a study in the community. In this 54-page study, they found that there were quite a few established shelters, but very few transitional homes—and none of these were specifically catered to Muslims.

What’s the difference between a shelter and a transitional home? Shelters only allow residents to stay for up to 2 weeks, whereas transitional homes allow for more extended stays, starting from at least a month, and going for even as long as a year. For a victim of domestic abuse, or someone suffering from homelessness, two weeks are barely enough to get their heads back to the right state, let alone turning their lives around and establishing themselves financially. This led to the realization that if we truly wanted to provide a long term solution, transitional homes would be the better option of the two.

For the purpose of the study, the brothers and sisters responsible for it also conducted some qualitative research. They went around to different shelters and transitional homes interviewing the management in order to understand how the homes are operated, what the running costs are, and other aspects related to transitional homes. Upon interviewing residents of different shelters, they found that the environment in these shelters can be very unsafe and inappropriate and would not be right for our struggling Muslim sisters with children.

Putting our trust in Allah, NZF finally took the leap. In September 2014, we established our first transitional home in the GTA area. The next month, we established our second one in Vancouver. Recently, in November 2017, we established our third transitional home in Windsor. All three homes have almost always been full since their opening.

So what have we accomplished with these transitional homes? Firstly, we have established a safe space for Muslim women and children, housing more than 220 women and children, and assisting more than 600 in general. Secondly, we believe in taking preventative measures to the issues in the community, so we have run events in the community in order to raise awareness about domestic abuse, sexual violence, homelessness and more—all of which have led to building strong community ties and partnerships. Finally, we have expanded our team and the services we offer, going from one Case Worker running one entire home, to having 2 designated Case Workers, a manager, and a counsellor at each home. In terms of services, we now offer one-to-one peer counselling, religious services, activities for the women and children, and more.

After our enormous success with our first 3 locations, our vision for 2025 is to have established more than 10 housing projects for Muslim women and children all over Canada. Please donate to our cause generously and help us in establishing a self-sufficient Muslim community.

I’d like to thank Sr. Yasmine, the National Project Manager for Nisa Homes, for her patience and for taking out the time to answer my questions. This article would not have been possible without her cooperation.

Written by: Areej H.