It’s an understatement to say that Margaret Bilson is passionate about finding housing for people in need. For the last twelve years, Margaret worked at Fife House, providing housing help for people living with HIV who are homeless or at risk of homelessness. At the beginning of 2023, she started here with us at Nellie’s as our new housing supervisor.

“As much as [working in] housing has become so much harder in the last 10-plus years, I love helping people find housing,” says Margaret. “Most of the time when you’re helping people who are homeless or are facing homelessness, you’re helping them at a time in their lives where they’re experiencing a major life event. It’s hard work, but it’s so important to have someone to help them navigate through this difficult time. I think it’s such an amazing thing to be able to do for work.”

As part of the Community Housing Support team, Margaret helps women and gender-diverse people who are experiencing gender-based violence find alternative housing. Although she has many years of experience providing housing help and working with people dealing with mental health issues and using substances, since coming to Nellie’s she’s appreciated the opportunity to learn much more about the VAW (violence against women) sector.

“I’ve learned a lot more about all the support that goes into serving people experiencing gender-based violence — things like safety planning, and how to help them deal with the police and the court system,” explains Margaret. “When I was growing up, my father was abusive to my mother. Like most women, I’ve experienced gender-based violence in my lifetime. It’s really meaningful to me to be doing this work.”

Since starting in her new role, one of Margaret’s goals has been to increase our outreach efforts to connect with more marginalized communities, to help us reach more women when they’re most in need. She’s also been working to create more partnerships with agencies who serve women with mental health and substance use challenges. “This is certainly something that Nellie’s has always supported, but there are a lot of women we’re not getting to who are extremely vulnerable,” says Margaret. “It’s very important to me that we’re doing more outreach to connect with these women.”

Working in an environment that empowers and centers women has been truly inspiring for Margaret. When talking about our empowerment self-defense programs and our healthy relationships workshops, she mentions that she wishes she had access to programs like this when she was younger. “I think it’s so exciting to think about empowering women at such a young age,” says Margaret.

“Hopefully through these programs we’re not just changing the narrative with women, but with young boys, too. And what a difference that’s going to make. When we’re working with women — all day, every day — who are experiencing so much violence from men, it’s really important to have hope that things will be different for women in the future. I’m a single mother to a beautiful seven-year-old girl, and I have to hope that the future will be better for her.”