Runners picked up their packets at Legacy Coffee in downtown Billings on Friday for this weekend's Run For Her event.
It's part of the Her Campaign, an organization that helps women who have been trafficked and the money raised from the run will go to help complete a shelter.
"We have a shelter home," said Kelvin Haidle, director of operations for the Her Campaign. "It's a beautiful home that all of our residential care locally occurs. There's just things that we just wanted to do to finish it up and to make it a really special place for any of the ladies who are a part of our programming."
This is the seventh year of the Run For Her, which has a virtual run, a 5k and a 10k.
"It starts just right on the edge of Josephine Crossing neighborhood," Haidle said. "This year our 10k is actually going to go into Riverside Park as well, and then come back through Norm's Island. It's a beautiful area to run."
The Her Campaign's biggest fundraiser goes toward its Marley House, where women find help after escaping human traffickers.
"What but I can tell you is that they're just sad," Haidle said about the women who have been trafficked. "They're coming from very difficult situations that look differently. But at the end of the day, they've been trafficked, they've been exploited and they've been deeply wounded."
The run helps to raise awareness.
"Human trafficking is a huge issue," Haidle said. "It happens everywhere. It happens right next door, happens all over even in our own city, let alone across the country. So there's a huge, huge need for places of care, and for those coming out of it. But there's also a huge lack in residential care too, and so we're trying to bridge that."
And the Her Campaign helps survivors of human trafficking "start their road of recovery and economic independence."
"You know, hope is such a beautiful thing and for somebody to experience hope and to step into it and to see that recovery happen," he said. "That's what it's all about, and it's a beautiful, beautiful thing. And it makes, makes the work that you do worth it."
The Run for Her starts at 9 a.m. Saturday at Josephine Crossing.
