'HOPE' for those fleeing polygamy

WASHINGTON, Washington County — When someone leaves the polygamous towns on the Utah-Arizona border, one of the first "outsiders" they encounter is Elaine Tyler.

She has become known as the woman you go to if you need a place to stay, some clothes, diapers for your kids or money to keep your power from getting shut off at the end of the month.

"I didn't have a vehicle and she was running me around, taking me to the WIC office and the welfare division and taking me around trying to get me everything that I needed," said Ailene Runs Through, who left the polygamous community of Centennial Park, Ariz. "They helped me so much, I don't know if I can repay them."

Tyler runs The HOPE Organization, a nonprofit, ragtag group of volunteers who help people leaving polygamy. In the last few years, Tyler estimates the group has provided help for dozens of women, children and the so-called "Lost Boys" who have either fled or been kicked out of the polygamous communities of Hildale and Colorado City.

From a tiny office just outside the St. George city limits, she gathers resources together to help them survive in the outside world.

"We try to just cover their basic needs," Tyler said. "They're coming out with nothing. The Lost Boys are living out of cars. They need housing, and once they get into an apartment, they need the furnishings. They need the pots and pans, they need beds, they need sheets, they need towels. Right now they need a clothes dryer."

Runs Through claims she left an abusive relationship with a man after almost three years.

"He was a very controlling person, very jealous," she said. When her husband told her he wanted to take a plural wife, she objected. Runs Through said it took her a while to work up the courage to walk out.

"It was a really bad relationship, and after having a kid with the guy, I did not want my daughter to have to go through that," she said. She contacted authorities for help and was hooked up with The HOPE Organization. Tyler drove out to Centennial Park to help Runs Through move out.

"She left with her clothes, her daughter's clothes and her daughter's toys," Tyler said. "She had nothing."

Life outside of the polygamous communities hasn't been easy.

Runs Through works two jobs. Sitting down for an interview with the Deseret Morning News, she had on a waitress uniform. Shy and nervous, she picks at the keys to a beater car she got from The HOPE Organization.