Men's night shelter to stop overnight accommodations in Chatham-Kent amidst COVID-19 concerns

Chatham Hope Haven, a shelter for men in Chatham-Kent, will be closing its overnight operations because of concerns its volunteers have about COVID-19.It is looking to the municipality to step in with a solution to find accommodations for 15 regulars it says are in critical need of shelter.

"They just really need help becausethey are out there during the day and we provide service at night, so during the day they can't self isolate," general manager Wanda Bellsaid. "We are unable to help with that because of our limited resources."

She said that safety procedures have been put in place at the shelter to deal with COVID-19 such as spacing the beds apart, implementing a hand-washing regimeand encouraging volunteers to wear masks and gloves, but concerns among thevolunteers that help out at the centre havegrown and fewer and fewer volunteers have been showing up.

"I don't blame anyone. They're wonderful people who are volunteering their time," Bell said.

"Sometimes they have family members who are older or who have compromised immune systems, and sometimes it's just they themselves that are afraid of contamination."

Nowhere to go

She said right now, the men have nowhere to go during the daytime.

"There's not even a place for them to go to the washroom because the library, the downtown Chatham mall, the Tim Hortons have closed so those are places that they used to [go] during the day," Bell said.

"They are maybe congregating together. They don't have family or friends so they come together and maybe aren't using best practices, so I just think that is causing a lot of fear."

She said the shelter will be stopping its operations on April 25and hopes a solution can be put in place before then.

"We do have a pretty good relationship with social services. However, it always takes time, and sometimes it's like two months before a man gets help that's needed," she said. "But there's urgency now."

She said other communities have made accommodations for the homeless by putting them up in motel rooms.

"Ideally, it would be nice to have apartments for them, but in this situation, even just a room would suffice," she said.

The centre could keep providing regular morning meals for the men, perhaps by delivery, she said. But those solutions need to be worked out.

She said that since the situation with COVID-19 has taken hold, the stress level among the population has grown and problems that are normally higher in the population are exasperated.

"We've had a couple of drug overdoses, and the idea of suicide and whatnot is very high on these populations normally, but moresoit's been recognized over the past couple of weeks," Bell said.

"I'm very, very worried about the men."

The municipality of Chatham-Kentsaid it is monitoring the situation and will discuss in upcoming meetings how itmay be able to help Hope Haven'sclients.