Harry Bailey says he and his wife didn't take in abused spouses and their children for praise from others.

They didn't donate their spare room because Bailey's mother was abused before divorcing his father. The 90-year-old retired civil engineer, who learned of the need for housing the victims of violence at local Quaker meetings, said his reason was simpler than that.

“You did it just because it was what needed to be done,” he said.

Advocates for abuse victims in Grass Valley are again relying on the love-thy-neighbor generosity of people like the Baileys as the area's only domestic violence shelter has been closed because of California's budget crisis.

Bailey said that before he and his wife, Lois, 92, started opening the doors of their Grass Valley home, there were almost no services available for domestic assault victims except for the emergency measures taken by local law enforcement.

“They were pretty distraught because they came out of a crisis situation,” he said. “We were concerned for the safety of the people that came to stay with us.”

The work Bailey and others did predated the arrival of groups like the Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault Coalition, which operated the shelter and now coordinates the safe house network. The coalition provides a range of services, including a 24-hour crisis line, legal aid and support groups.

As these services increased and were “professionalized,” the role of ordinary people in helping victims declined, said the coalition's executive director, Niko Johnson.

Bailey's granddaughter, Kristen Darling, 26, now works for the group to promote healthy relationships.

“Every day we see a situation that we have not encountered before,” Darling said.

They serve much of the county, and rely on the state and federal government for 84 percent of their money.

But the group's shelter, which maintained a staff of three and beds for 12 at a cost of more than $60,000 a year, closed as it awaited a late state budget. Another two shelters in Ventura County also closed. Four other shelters that closed after a funding cut last year have reopened.

Officials say it is unlikely the Grass Valley shelter will be reopened even if some funding is guaranteed. The proposed state budget includes about $20 million for the Domestic Violence Program, but that could change as lawmakers wrangle to close the state's $19 billion budget deficit.

Now, neighbors have returned to relying on each other to help those in need of shelter services, with some remaking their homes into makeshift safe houses.

Gwen Durling, a spokeswoman for the California Emergency Management Agency, which oversees the shelter program, said even though the state budget was creating a problem for victim-services agencies, they have still found a way to provide their core services.

But some local advocates, safe-house providers and law-enforcement officials said the private homes are less safe than shelters because fewer people entails a greater risk. They also say the services for victims are less robust and immediate than they would be if trained staff were on hand.

Capt. Jeff Powell of the Nevada County Sheriff's Office said having volunteers was “better than nothing,” but not ideal.

“The volunteers in the absence of the shelter are important, but in the middle of the night a victim who comes over and got three kids and some of them could be infants, I don't know,” said Powell. “It's probably helpful, but probably not as all encompassing as a shelter where they're given advice by professionals and the victim is comforted.”

Victims who have experienced both the professionally run shelter and the safe houses say the former is best.

“The house I lived in that they closed down was the best experience I had,” one woman said of the shelter. “They got me to open up.”

She said she had been physically and mentally abused by her boyfriend for 10 years.

“I got so closed up,” said the woman, speaking anonymously because she fled from an abusive relationship. “I didn't look at nobody.”

She said she was comforted by the camaraderie and sympathy of other people in a similar predicament.

But the safe house providers feel gratified to know that they're doing what they can in a difficult circumstance.

One woman, 54, who says she was emotionally abused when her husband refused to take her to the hospital when her colon ruptured, was a client of the coalition. Now she provides space in her house for the Coalition's safe housing network.

“Two empty rooms when people are sleeping on the streets is horrible,” said the woman, who asked not to be identified so that the location of her house remains secret to protect her tenants. “They're terrified, and I know that feeling.”