A Vancouver drug and alcohol recovery house for aboriginal women from the Downtown Eastside could soon be closed because its funding is being cut by the federal government.

The grant money for the Young Wolf Lodge will stop at the end of March, and there has been no word on replacement funding, says a spokesman for the group that operates the facility.

The shelter in a Vancouver house helps young women get off the streets and clean up their lives.

Bob Manning of the Urban Native Youth Association told CBC News that the Vancouver facility is only one of hundreds of other shelters across Canada in the same predicament.

He said that despite a promise last year of more money, the Conservative government has delayed implementing a replacement program, which means shelter operators don't know if or when they would be able to apply for new grants.

'… this program saved my life. I probably would be dead without it.'—Mercedes Demkiw, Young Wolf Lodge resident

Manning said shelters will have to write proposals for new funding once a new program is introduced, but in the meantime, there will be a funding gap that may kill some programs.

"And some programs, I don't know if we will be able to economically weather that delay and to be able to reopen again. That's going to be the hard part."

Will it harm women on the streets?

Manning says that for women hoping to escape life on the streets, the results could be tragic.

"A lot of people will be on the streets again. And that's scary because it puts them again in harm's way of predators that could be on the streets."

Mercedes Demkiw, who lives at the Young Wolf Lodge, said the prospect of the home being closed is frightening.

"You know this program saved my life. I probably would be dead without it. This is our safe place to go. To think that we might not have that, it's devastating."

The Greater Vancouver Regional District warned last week that 23 social programs are at risk across the Lower Mainland because of the funding cut. It added there has been no clarification from the federal government on how the groups will be able to apply for new money.