New Yorkers harmed by interactions with the criminal justice system, domestic violence and other traumatic life events now have another place to go to help them move forward, as officials say demand for social services is increasing.
The city’s fourth trauma recovery center opened Tuesday at the Center for Community Alternatives on Chapel Street in Downtown Brooklyn, with more than $1 million in City Council funding, officials said. In line with the nonprofit’s mission, the facility will focus on assisting formerly incarcerated people with free counseling and access to essential services like housing, education and food. Crime survivors, low-income people and immigrants can also take advantage of the site’s resources, which are confidential, according to officials.
Dulande Louis, director of the Jewish Community Council of Greater Coney Island’s trauma recovery center, said these facilities fill important community needs by providing holistic services in one location. She’s said she’s witnessed an alarming rise in intimate-partner violence through her work, including a roughly 10% annual jump in the number of people seeking help at her center since it opened in 2023.
“People are going to bed at night with a great deal of anxiety, nervous systems dysregulation, children are exposed to the violence in the home. … That’s why this work is extremely important,” Louis said. Two-thirds of her clients in the past year alone were domestic violence survivors, she added.
According to a report from the National Alliance of Trauma Recovery Centers, the city’s three previous facilities served nearly 1,200 people in 2024, 81% of whom were people of color. Around 40% of those clients had survived domestic violence, 21% had experienced gun violence and 19% had been physically assaulted, the data showed. The other two sites are in East Flatbush and Williamsbridge.
“We can talk a lot about how mental health care and services can be effective in the recovery journey. But if I don't know where my next meal is coming from, I don't care to process my traumatic experiences because I am in survivor mode,” Louis said.
The city’s trauma recovery center initiative began two years ago, when the City Council invested $5 million to establish the first facility in partnership with the nonprofit Astor Services in the Bronx. The Council has continued to push for more funding for the program, according to Speaker Adrienne Adams. In a statement, she said the centers are “a pillar of our public safety infrastructure” and help save lives.
Assata Terry, the Downtown Brooklyn center’s clinical director, said it has already received client referrals from organizations across the city, including hospitals and other nonprofits dedicated to prisoner re-entry. Lucy Chrysiliou, another director at the Center for Community Alternatives, said the site’s focus on formerly incarcerated people is meant to break “cycles of harm and violence.”
“That's a population that oftentimes [has] unaddressed trauma,” she said.
