Island clergy organize to open doors for winter homeless population

A group of faith organizations want to use church properties for a rotating nighttime homeless shelter from January to March.

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St. Andrew's in Edgartown opened its doors as a temporary homeless shelter this winter. — Photo by Monica Busch

Island Clergy Association members are devising a plan to operate a rotating winter homeless shelter from January to March. St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church in Edgartown is spearheading the initiative, under the leadership of the Reverend Vincent “Chip” Seadale.

If all goes as planned, a group of churches would alternate hosting duties from week to week during the winter months. The proposal calls for Island churches and faith groups to share resources and volunteers and take on the responsibility for housing homeless Islanders overnight.

The group’s largest challenge has been securing space. In a recent phone call with The Times, the Rev. Seadale said building availability is a problem.

“There’s such great demand for that space that they really can’t in good conscience find a way to make it work. Even some of the larger churches, the Catholic Church and the Methodist Church, find it very difficult to provide space for that,” he said.

The other major concern is that those who use the service might occasionally become disruptive or rowdy. The Rev. Seadale believes that people in need of shelter would not want to jeopardize their opportunity for warmth.

“Basically the sort of person who comes to use the facilities is not going to cause a problem, and that’s the main concern at the informational meetings we’ve been having,” he said. He added that an integral part of the plan would be communication with the church neighbors, as well as communication with the police.

The shelter idea was first proposed in March. Informational meetings began this summer. The Rev. Seadale said at least 100 volunteers have signed up, meeting what he described as an arbitrary estimate for the manpower needed to make the program successful. Volunteer shifts will run from 6 pm to 10 pm and from 10 pm to 6 am, and will include serving dinner and breakfast respectively.

But the future of the program is dependent upon the space. So far, only St. Andrew’s has agreed to make space available.

Space is key

“We’re still kind of in limbo for the space of this effort,” the Rev. Seadale said. “I haven’t asked the board [of St. Andrew’s] whether they’d be willing to be the only church opening its doors seven days a week for January, February, and March … We’re really holding off on answering that question until we have another church come forward.”

The Rev. Seadale said the churches have approached the County of Dukes County to no avail, for use of the former VNA building in Tisbury. The county engineered the purchase of the building by the six Island towns for use by the Center for Living, which does not need all of the available space. He said that county manager Martina Thornton is aware of the clergy’s dilemma.

“We’d initially approached with the possibility of using the VNA building they’ve acquired. She’s not sure if that would be a feasible use,” he said.

Ms. Thornton said that all the towns would have to agree to use the upstairs portion of the building for a shelter. She recommended that the clergy approach the various town selectmen to seek town support.

“But, that’s probably not something the churches have time or capability to do well,” the Rev. Seadale said. “We’re not sure if that would be a possibility, so we’re still kind of stuck there.”

Former county associate commissioner of homelessness Connie Teixeira used to help the clergy organize homeless-shelter efforts by screening requests for assistance, but Ms. Teixeira resigned in January, and no one has filled the position.

“It seems to us that there’s really no system in place or program in place to help people, at least in the winter months,” he said.

Ms. Thornton told The Times in a phone discussion that turning a portion of the VNA building into a homeless shelter would require all the towns to be on board with the project. She said then there would need to be a consensus about who or what body would run the shelter, who would shoulder liability, and who would handle bringing the building up to zoning codes.

Moving target

So how many homeless are there, and how is homelessness defined? The numbers and definitions are murky.

The Rev. Seadale said he and the Island Clergy Association are basing the need on the frequency of requests they receive for assistance, something he said has increased over the years.

“That’s kind of a moving-target number, and I don’t say that to be secretive as much as it depends on what definition you use for homelessness or being unhoused,” he said.

Initially, the group thought that the homelessness problem on the Island was getting worse, but because of affordable housing discussions, the group concluded that the need was actually being better identified.

Part of what the group is doing, he said, is to gauge the need by physically offering the space. He expects a real estimate would not be possible until the shelter is up and running for a few consecutive winters.

“We’re well aware that the homeless population is not necessarily going to come and pour out to use these services or facilities right away,” the Rev. Seadale said. “We suspect that if we do this for two or three winters straight, we’ll have a better idea of what kind of services are needed out there, and probably start to grow in number. We don’t believe we’ll be getting even 10 people at night. We believe there may be some nights, at least in the first winter season, when we may close our doors at eight for lack of participation.”

He does not expect families with children to take advantage of the services at all, for fear of state intervention.

“Families with young children won’t come because they’re concerned with the well-being of their family and they’re afraid that [the Department of Children and Families] will come show up on the steps,” he said.

However, he said, the group can expect to house some groups on a shorter, emergency basis, such as domestic abuse victims, or elderly who lose their leases. The Rev. Seadale said that in the past week alone, he’s received calls from the Council on Aging reporting three unhoused elderly people on the Island.
“There’s enough people coming to ask us for funding in the winter months that there needs to be a space available on the Island for people who need this kind of thing,” he said.

Wareham model

A group of churches in Wareham have been opening their doors to the town’s homeless for the past seven winters for “Nights of Hospitality,” a project that its leader Pastor David Shaw of the Emmanuel Church of the Nazarene said has been both successful and low-budget. The largest issue the Wareham group has faced is zoning, which limits the available space to three church buildings. As building regulations have caught up with the group, costly upgrades needed to install additions such as sprinkler systems have inhibited some groups from hosting. As a result, the Rev. Shaw said those churches whose hosting capabilities have been halted have offered their volunteers in lieu of space.

“With each successive year, more of those are being enforced. I think we’re probably up to the limit now,” he said. He also added that the Americans with Disabilities Act comes into play for the shelters, too, which requires handicap access to the buildings.

The Wareham group services what the Rev. Shaw refers to as “chronically homeless individuals,” or adults living outside or without a stable housing environment. He said the ratio between those who live outside and those who are suddenly without a consistent home is about equal.

The Rev. Shaw said that they average five to seven people seeking refuge on any given night, but sometimes they have as many as 14. He estimated that about 50 people have spent at least a single night at the shelter in the past seven years.

Notably, the Wareham shelter program is a “wet” shelter, which means it welcomes patrons who are drunk, so long as they are not belligerent.

“My finding is that they’re very appreciative that they have a warm place to stay, and they don’t want to rock the boat.”

“The first year we did it, we recognized that the most obvious candidates for coming into the shelter were some of the people in town that we knew were usually drunk, and if we didn’t allow that, then we really weren’t going to be providing a service to people we thought were at the greatest risk.”

In Wareham, he said, they’ve had a number of people die of exposure due to cold temperatures.

“Even if they’re drunk, they need to be brought in off the street,” he said.

He expects at least the same three churches that operated last year to be operating this year.