ASHLAND — For the past week, Ashland’s Corner Park has been decorated with clotheslines of white shirts adorned with messages like “stop blaming my body for your harassment” and “intoxicated is not consent.”
Statistics on sexual violence, the #MeToo hashtag and awareness ribbons were common themes on the dozens of shirts on display at the intersection of two of Ashland’s busiest streets.
The shirts were designed by survivors of sexual abuse or domestic violence or their friends and family as a part of Safe Haven of Ashland’s Clothesline Project, put together to commemorate Sexual Violence Awareness Month.
“It offers survivors an opportunity to just kind of take their voices back, tell their own stories in their own way by writing them on these shirts that kind of act like a little gallery that community members and other survivors can walk through and read the stories, read statistics,” Kristina Clady, the Outreach and Prevention Coordinator of Rape, Crisis, and Domestic Violence at Safe Haven.
“It’s just a great way to really empower survivors in an anonymous way.”
Safe Haven is a local non-profit associated with the Appleseed Community Mental Health Center focused on helping survivors of domestic and sexual violence.
The organization has housed 28 survivors at its shelter so far in 2023. Last year, it housed 36 adults and 18 children and answered 603 calls on its 24-hour hotline, according to the organization’s 2022 impact report.
Safe Haven also hosts support groups, conducts training and advocates for survivors in court, in hospitals, on campus and in the community, according to its website.
The clothesline project started at Ashland University before it moved to Corner Park, and the college community gave Safe Haven some “really great” feedback on the project, Clady said.
April 28 was the project’s last day at Corner Park before it moves to Central Park in Loudonville from May 2 to 5.
According to Clady, domestic and sexual violence is likely more prevalent in Ashland County than most people think; one in four women and one in six men will be the victim of sexual or domestic violence at some point in their lives.
Community members who want to reduce sexual or domestic violence should get to know their neighbors and be “the type of person that people want to tell things” by being “non-judgmental and a good-listener,” and should keep Safe Haven in mind, Clady said.
“We get neighbors calling all the time that are like, I think that this is happening next door to me and I don’t know what to do. So just knowing the resources and being an available open person to those around you,” she said.
Survivors can reach out to Safe Haven via its hotline at 419-289-8085 or its phone number at 419-282-6097. Community members in immediate danger should call 911, according to its website.
