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New Program in the US Offers a Way Out of Prostitution

Cincinnati, Ohio offers a place where women can exit a life of prostitution.

Call it the School for Prostitutes. It's not where women learn how to sell themselves. It's where women who already do might learn how to stop. Cincinnati Union Bethel, a 176-year-old, non-profit social services agency, started the "Off the Streets" program in April to help women break out of the cycle of selling sex, feeding drug habits and answering to pimps.

Off the Streets provides prostitutes with counseling. It tries to give them support, something many haven't had since they first sold themselves. It provides advice on careers and a place to live. Newcomers talk to women who successfully left "the life." "This program offers comprehensive assistance to women who want to make some changes, women who literally want to get off the street," says Mary Carol Melton, program director. It began after Cincinnati and Hamilton County criminal justice leaders started searching for a way to reduce prostitution arrests. They eventually focused on a program 2,300 miles away.

Idea is Spreading
Fourteen years ago, Norma Hotaling started SAGE (Standing Against Global Exploitation) in San Francisco after being in and out of jail more than 30 times on various prostitution, drug and petty theft charges. She wanted to escape life on the streets and wanted to help other women do the same thing. Cincinnati is the fifth city to emulate the program. St. Paul's version is called Breaking Free. Phoenix has Dignity House. Kansas City has Veronica's Closet, and Fresno has Marjaree Mason Center. Boston, Seattle and San Diego are looking to start programs, Hotaling said.

Vednita Carter, founder and executive director of Breaking Free, says the program has made a mark in St. Paul since it began in 1996. She says her greatest success isn't in numbers. "It's seeing people move into their first apartment, put their name on the mailbox and buy their first TV," Carter says. "It's a beautiful thing for them to say: 'I deserve this. I'm part of society.' Hotaling says, "It's a dream to watch the program being started elsewhere." That was part of her plan from the beginning, she says. "We wanted to develop the appropriate services for women all over who have been treated badly ... by institutions and services," Hotaling says. "I wanted to make sure what worked here, other places could pick up."

Andrea Bertone, director of a website run by the Academy for Educational Development, HumanTrafficking.org, praises programs that look at all the problems that trap people in a life of prostitution. "Prostitution is a very complex problem that isn't solved with one service," Bertone says. "Teams work best because people need to address a wide range of problems. It takes time and effort to change the thought process that got them there."

Addressing a Top Complaint
Cincinnati police Capt. Howard Rahtz says prostitution is second only to drugs as a top complaint of neighborhood leaders in the city. Johns looking for sex troll streets, sometimes mistaking residents for hookers, says Amy Krings Barnes, community liaison at Cincinnati's Community Police Partnering Center. They take prostitutes to abandoned buildings, she says, and drug dealers follow the women knowing they'll be customers. "Prostitution is the world's oldest profession," Rahtz says. "I'm sure police trying to do something about it is the second-oldest." In the past, the strategy for dealing with prostitution was basically arrest-and-release. At most, Rahtz says, prostitutes would get a short jail stay, and police would see the same women on the same corners and arrest them on the same charges. "For the first time, we really have an alternative," he says. "In the long run, I expect it will be really positive."

Since April, 21 women have come to Off the Streets, and success already is evident, Melton says. Six have not used drugs or alcohol since entering the program, and seven have not been involved in prostitution, she says. Melton says one woman, for the first time in years, did not use drugs after receiving her assistance check. Three women have gotten jobs, she says. Sheila Reisch, 44, came to the Anna Louise Inn, the downtown Cincinnati women's dormitory where Off the Streets is based, on May 25 looking for a place to stay. She got a room and a brochure about the program. Reisch, who had been trading sex for money since "somewhere in the '80s," says she had tried other programs without success. She thought she'd try again. "This one is different," says Reisch, whose short, groomed brown hair and pantsuit make her look ready for a day of work at the office. "No program before ever addressed prostitution, it was always just about drugs." Reisch says some days are harder than others, but she refuses to go back to the street. She says the program has taught her a lot about herself. "I'm a worthy person," she says. "Once you deal with the shame and guilt you're left with you. What I did out there is not who I am."

Adapted from: Sharon Coolidge. "Out of 'the life,' they learn to live." USA TODAY. 18 August 2006.