Ann Bedsole’s book “Leave Your Footprint” catalogs a lifetime of accomplishments across the State of Alabama, especially along the Gulf Coast. As a state senator she brought the 911 emergency system to Alabama. She helped create the Alabama School of Math and Science in Mobile, organized the Tricentennial Celebration, and championed the renovation of Bienville Square. Perhaps her proudest achievement was the creation of the Sybil H. Smith Family Village for homeless women and children in Mobile.
That Mobile program, an 18-unit transition home, went on to change hundreds of lives — and its model has now crossed the bay.
From Mobile to Baldwin County
The Sybil H. Smith Village program opened in 1999 and quickly earned its reputation: within a two-year transition period, roughly 85 to 90 percent of residents left the Village with their own homes, jobs and the life skills needed to live independently. The term “village” is a meaningful distinction — it is truly a village of women and children learning to live independently, break harmful relationships and become self-sufficient.
Seeing that success, Rev. Darren McClellan of Fairhope United Methodist Church knew Baldwin County needed the same thing. A single phone call to Dumas Wesley Community Center executive director Kate Carver set the plans in motion; by the end of the day, meetings were being arranged between the church’s leadership team and the Dumas Wesley executive board to work toward opening a transitional housing facility for women and children in Baldwin County.
An assisted living facility that had been vacant for some time was found. The property owner, who lived behind the building, had a friend who had long envisioned it becoming a shelter for homeless women and children — a carving of that vision remained on her porch. The Baldwin Family Village Foundation was formed, and the building was purchased through the generosity of hundreds of donors for $700,000, with an additional $540,000 raised for its first year of operations.
How the Village Works
The Baldwin Family Village officially opened in late April 2023, and its first resident arrived on May 6. Operated by the Dumas Wesley Community Center — a Mobile mission organization founded in 1903 by the United Methodist Women — the program is modeled after the Sybil H. Smith Village and provides 12 months of housing stability and wrap-around services.
Residents are interviewed and must pass a drug test before being accepted. Each is assigned a room and household chores and must seek full-time employment or attend school full-time. Each resident is counseled by a case manager to ensure a positive path toward full independence, and professional volunteers teach budgeting, health, parenting and other skills.
“It’s a holistic approach, and we take each resident on a case-by-case basis,” says director Margie Walters. “We hope each resident will transition to permanent housing within 12 to 14 months, and so far, the success rate after one year is 85 percent. Former residents call every week to stay in touch.”
The numbers behind the program are striking. Baldwin Family Village has served more than 200 individuals since opening, and in a recent year its success rate among residents who exited into permanent housing reached 94 percent — dramatically above the national average. The facility can shelter up to 35 residents at a time and has run at full occupancy, with dozens of women and children on the waiting list.
Independent by Design
One of the program’s defining decisions is the refusal of government funding. The Board of Directors made the difficult choice to forgo federal funds so the program could streamline service delivery, serve more people, and shelter both homeless women with children and homeless single women — something HUD regulations had prohibited.
Running independently of federal funding also lets the staff conduct same-day intakes and house eligible candidates within a 24-hour window, bypassing the weeks-long waiting periods that federal processes once entailed, according to Kate Carver, executive director of Dumas Wesley. The Village is funded instead through grants, church support and private donations — “a boots-on-the-ground operation,” as its leaders put it, that depends on volunteers for meals, childcare during life-skills classes, transportation and more.
The Invisible Homeless
One of the hardest parts of addressing homelessness in Baldwin County is simply seeing it. The Sea Glass Initiative in Foley takes crisis calls daily, and Baldwin Family Village receives calls every day from individuals looking for housing. People experiencing homelessness in Baldwin County are often living in encampments in the woods near parks, out of sight of the communities around them.
Susie Cerf, who had watched homelessness reshape a neighborhood in California, learned about the Village through a community gathering at the home of a Fairhope church member, where the guest speakers asked a pointed question: who takes care of the homeless? The church community, it turned out, was the answer — and she resolved to help get the word out. She and other volunteers, including a group of newcomers who call themselves the Sweetwater Girls, now provide a meal to residents once a month, taking turns preparing and delivering food.
“It’s been fun getting to know the ladies, and preparing and helping deliver the food. The residents are always so thankful,” one of the volunteers says. “When you see success, it encourages others to do what they can to help. Together, we can set healthy boundaries and make a difference in the lives of others.”
Breaking the Cycle
The Village’s mission statement is straightforward: break the cycle of homelessness and help women and children re-establish self-sufficiency through accountability, case management, life skills and behavior modification. Community information gatherings — like the “Gathering for Goodness: Breaking the Cycle of Homelessness” hosted at Fairhope United Methodist Church’s Community Life Center — invite the public to learn how to help.
The need remains enormous. By one count from the Baldwin County Public School System, hundreds of school-age children were identified as homeless in a recent school year, and a large share of crisis calls to United Way from Baldwin County relate to housing assistance. Organizations like Baldwin Family Village exist because the need does not pause.
What the Village offers, in the end, is the same thing Ann Bedsole imagined for Mobile two decades ago: a village — women and children who must learn to live independently, break harmful relationships and become self-sufficient citizens, all under one roof with a community behind them. In Fairhope, that dream has come true for dozens of families already, and the volunteers who deliver the meals are making sure it keeps coming true, one month and one meal at a time.