Jan McDonald, who worked at Carrie’s Place for two years and became the manager in December, said funding for the service was tenuous.

Carrie’s Place received an injection of money three years ago from the State Government, but this will run out in March 2011.

“The sad thing is, I will be spending a lot of my time sourcing funding instead of doing what we do best – helping the women,” Ms McDonald said.

Carrie’s Place offers three major services – a women and children’s refuge, a resource centre, and a domestic violence court advocacy service.

Without adequate money, Carrie’s Place would be forced to drop the resource centre and court service, and focus on crisis accommodation.

“It would be just the crisis accommodation, which is vital in itself, but it’s not eroding the damage domestic violence does,” Ms McDonald said.

“(The crisis accommodation) is a Band-Aid solution to some degree.”

Ms McDonald said the other arms provided vital early intervention and post-crisis support, which help to break the cycle of domestic violence.

She called on businesses and the State and Federal Governments to help keep the doors open.

Ms McDonald said the service endured a period of

instability last year and she planed to steer it “back to its grass roots”.