Family-friendly housing with resources are available for those visiting family in the SD State Penitentiary. Photo by Lou Vogt / Family Connection of Sioux Falls
Family Connection offers affordable housing for families of prisoners
By Richie Richards
Native Sun News Staff Writer
www.nsweekly.com SIOUX FALLS –– On May 8 (Mother’s Day), Family Connection of Sioux Falls, will celebrate its 20th year of continued service and support to people with family held in the South Dakota State Prison system in Sioux Falls. Family Connection’s hospitality houses provide housing and facilities to support visiting families who may not be able to afford a local hotel/motel room or have family in Sioux Falls to stay during prison visits. This non-profit organization opened its doors in May 1996 on Mother’s Day with one house located on the corner of Minnesota Avenue and Seventh Street in downtown Sioux Falls. Since then, Family Connection has opened a second hospitality house for families. It was during a talk at an Impact of Crime on Victims classes which led to a speaking engagement for a support group called WAIT (We Are Inmates Too) that Anne Marie Rosseling, a survivor of incest, received the calling from God to support mothers, wives and family members of prisoners. “It was that evening that I had an opportunity to hear the stories and experiences of these dear women who were struggling with same and pain for a crime they did not commit. Their burden was heavy, yet so many were concerned about other wives and mothers,” Rosseling discusses in a written history of Family Connection in 2006. This burden on families of visiting prisoners is a constant throughout the incarceration period. The burden adds to the emotional stress of traveling to see loved ones. Said Rosseling, “I learned that the families with an incarcerated loved one are the ‘invisible prisoners’ that most of us do not see or think about, and they too are ‘doing time.’”
Read the rest of the story on the all new Native Sun News website: Family Connection offers affordable housing for families of prisoners (Contact Richie Richards at staffwriter1@nsweekly.com) Copyright permission Native Sun News
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