Basalt domestic violence shelter ends its capital campaign with $9.65 million
Response hosts community celebration Wednesday at construction site

Regan Mertz/The Aspen Times
A sleek, black limo shuttled community members from the Basalt Park and Ride to 325 E. Cody Lane — the site of the town’s first domestic violence shelter.
Just a few minutes drive around a curved road on Wednesday, the skeleton of the Diane and Bruce Halle Center for Hope and Healing stands among construction equipment and woods.
Originally estimated at $7.7 million, the building is now estimated at $9.7 million. This is because of increasing building costs, Response Executive Director Shannon Meyer said.
Response, an Aspen-based non-profit that helps domestic- and sexual-abuse survivors, has raised $9.65 million out of the estimated $9.7 million it will take to complete the shelter.
“We’re happy to just cover all of our needs for the building and being able to keep ourselves on track,” she said. “And as of today, we have a gap of just under $50,000, so we’ve raised $9.65 million in about 16 months. So, we feel pretty good about that.”

Arizona-based Diane and Bruce Halle Foundation — which resulted in the shelter name the Diane and Bruce Halle Center for Hope and Healing — supplied the initial donation for the capital campaign.
Response also received money from several different municipalities in its coverage area.
Snowmass, despite being the smallest town in the upper Roaring Fork Valley, was the first municipality to donate, eventually accumulating $50,000 in support. Pitkin County gave the most with nearly $500,000, and the city of Aspen gave $250,000. In total, $870,000 was donated from municipalities.
“Every municipality in our service area, which is western Eagle to Pitkin County, has contributed some amount, which is fabulous,” Meyer said.
As of the community gathering, the building is 98% enclosed since ground broke in November 2023, with builders just waiting on the doors. The siding will be installed once the building is 100% enclosed.

The building will be 6,770 square feet and includes office space, client rooms, a food and clothing pantry, deed-restricted housing units, and a 17-space parking lot.
The shelter will have, what Meyer calls, seven efficiency units. Five of these units will be geared toward families staying at the shelter. These units act as extended stay hotels with private bathrooms, a kitchenette, a dining room, and a living room. There is also a fenced play yard outside for children.
There will be beds for nine adults and 15 children at one time. These suite-style units are meant to house people for two to three months.
“With that kind of scheduling and that number of beds, we anticipate serving 40 to 50 survivors in the shelter portion of the center per year,” Meyer said.

Once completed, the Diane and Bruce Halle Center for Hope and Healing will be an open, public-facing structure.
This is an important design detail, Meyer said: “Rather than saying you are a survivor of domestic abuse, we’re going to hide you away,” she added. “By having this kind of beautiful building out in the open, it’s destigmatizing the experience of survivors in our community. Also, just by having a much more public presence, we hope to see more people coming to us, both for services and to be part of the organization.”
Not all survivors require housing. Response serves 175 to 200 survivors a year, including survivors of domestic or sexual abuse, stalking, or human trafficking.

In 2022, Response served 171 survivors. In 2023, the organization served 184, but Meyer, who has worked at Response for seven years, said that the number may be increasing due to the organization receiving more exposure and reaching more people.
“The biggest jump that we had was definitely during the pandemic,” shw said. “But those numbers have stayed high, and we’ve seen a smaller incremental increase every year. I do think a lot of that is due to just more exposure for Response. So, people who are experiencing domestic abuse are more likely to know about our services, and they’re able to come get services from us. And I think that the Halle Center will go a long way to increasing that exposure as well.”
The opening date of the Diane and Bruce Halle Center for Hope and Healing remains on track, with the doors set to open within a week of Jan. 3, 2025.
To contact Response, call 970-920-5357, or email info@responsehelps.org.
The 24/7 crisis helpline is 970-925-SAFE (7233).

Regan Mertz can be reached at 970-429-9153 or rmertz@aspentimes.com.
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