From Hailey Virusso, Preble Street Director of Anti-Trafficking Services:
Closing out a federal grant is both a tumultuous and grounding experience. In the flurry of contingency planning, documentation, and endings are also the stories of resilience, of healing, of love.
At Preble Street, love is the difference – love for the journey, love during pain, love at the end. In three years, our Anti-Trafficking program has borne witness to great love: families reunited locally and across borders, college degrees attained, survivors signing their first leases, and most importantly, the feeling of safety within their body and heart.
Every day we stand alongside survivors as they fall in love with themselves, with their strength, their grit, their unnecessary resilience. We believe in the power of love, and the doors love can open. We believe in the power of community and how communities can rise together and thrive. We believe in the power of collective action, our voices demanding change to end this form of structural violence. This day is sad, but it does not mean our work is over – it means that we need to endure this moment of duress to be sure that we answer the call of the next survivor seeking to leave, seeking to make change, seeking to be heard.
Much like survivors, who have survived before our program and will survive after us – our program will survive this but we believe in much more than surviving. Maine’s commitment to supporting survivors of trafficking must be prioritized and we will not stop advocating for solutions that keep all of our community members safe.
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Take Action: Tell Maine to provide permanent funding for emergency shelters!
UPDATE FEBRUARY 24, 2026: Mainers experiencing homelessness need you to advocate for shelter funding now! After the public hearing and work session on the shelter funding bill earlier this month, the Housing and Economic Development Committee has tabled the bill and is scheduling another work session. We cannot let this bill die in committee! From York to
Staff highlight: Annick Nzeyimana – Walking alongside clients
Preble Street staff are #CompassionInAction, and we want you to get to know them! This month we’re introducing you to Annick Nzeyimana, Case Worker, Anti-Trafficking Services. How long have you worked at Preble Street? I have been working at Preble Street and in the Anti-Trafficking Services program for the past two years. What do you like most about your role? What
Preble Street testimony in support of permanent, sustainable funding for Maine emergency shelters
Maine needs and deserves safe, accessible, professionally run, and sustainable emergency shelters that can meet the needs of the growing number of individuals and families experiencing homelessness in our state. On Tuesday, February 10, 2026, shelter executive directors and staff from across the state went to Augusta to advocate for a sustainable funding source that
