ORDER PACEM’s 12-month 2023 CALENDAR, featuring butterflies by local photographer Henry Strauss.
Who we are …
We are a grassroots organization that works with 80 local congregations and community groups and 3,000 volunteers to provide shelter and related services to the homeless. Our name is the latin word for “peace” and also an acronym for “People And Congregations Engaged in Ministry.”
PACEM in the NEWS

PACEM at Premier Circle
June 15, 2021: One year ago, PACEM began supervising and staffing the stay of individuals experiencing homelessness at a nearby hotel (La Quinta Inn and Suites). We continued to offer those services until May 1 of this year when we…
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Area nonprofits resort to buying a hotel to address local housing and homelessness crisis
Charlottesville Tomorrow: Every year, a roaming homeless shelter opens for the winter months in the Charlottesville area More than a year into the COVID-19 pandemic, there’s no need to restate the havoc it has wrought so far on billions of…
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With less shelter space and more hotel rooms, PACEM adapts to COVID while planning winter homeless shelter
Charlottesville Tomorrow: Every year, a roaming homeless shelter opens for the winter months in the Charlottesville area. The local group PACEM sets up temporary lodgings for a week or two at a time in various churches around the city and…
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PACEM's 2020-21 Shelter Season
If you've followed PACEM since March 2020 then you know the extraordinary measures we've taken to keep our homeless guests sheltered. 9 months is longer than our normal shelter season yet we are still providing a version of it to…
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ORDER PACEM’S 12-month 2021 CALENDAR, featuring native birds of Albemarle County, Virginia
ORDER PACEM’s 12-month 2021 CALENDAR, featuring native birds of Albemarle County, Virginia, photographed by Henry Strauss. TO PURCHASE, please follow this link: https://pacemshelter.square.site/. All proceeds benefit PACEM Women's Shelter! "As Women’s Case Manager, it has been an honor to work…
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Solutions sought for homelessness challenges posed by pandemic
CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. (Charlottesville Tomorrow) – For Jim Bourn, a man from Brighton, Michigan, experiencing homelessness, Charlottesville is something of a mystery. “I’m lost here,” he said. Every night from March 23 to June 3, though, Bourn had a familiar place…
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Charlottesville shelter looks to extend female services for spring and summer months
CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. (WVIR) - An organization providing shelter for people in the greater Charlottesville area is trying to expand its services for women with no place to go in the spring and summer months. People and Congregations Engaged in Ministries (PACEM)…
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Answering the call: PACEM seeks to create a permanent women’s shelter
C-VILLE Weekly: Last August, Chinikqua Joseph’s Buckingham County home burned down. Thankfully, no one was injured or killed by the fire, but she, along with her mother and godmother, lost everything. They were homeless. While looking for housing, Joseph stayed…
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Secure Seniors Program is a success for the homeless
CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. (CBS19 NEWS) -- Two local homeless advocacy nonprofits are seeing some success housing homeless seniors. PACEM is working with the group AIM and the two have developed a program to help seniors get into an affordable housing situation. It's…
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Spring/Summer 2019 Newsletter
TOPICS INCLUDE: Life Inside Our Shelters as Captured by Photographer Mai Shurtleff, The Director’s Column, the 2018-19 Season By-the-Numbers, A Success Story Download: Spring-Summer 2019 Newsletter
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