Kamloops emergency overnight shelter spread thin with cold winter conditions
Cold, wet winter weather is creating a dangerous situation for people in the homeless community in Kamloops.
Volunteers at an outreach organization, The Loop, have been buckling down to provide food, warmth and shelter overnight since the first snowfall on Thursday, Nov. 3, trying to fill the gaps left when the Canadian Mental Health Association backed out of its deal to operate two winter homeless shelters late.
“This is beyond urgent,” said Karina Laitres, volunteer at The Loop. “People are completely soaked through their layers of clothes and sleeping in that. We are seeing the negative and scary health repercussions of this on their feet and hands, with major infections. One man required hospital care for his feet.”
Laitres said people from seniors to youth and every age in between, including a family of five with three young children, have been accessing services at the facility on the 400-block of Tranquille for the past few nights.
But the small facility is stretched thin for bedding, mats, winter clothes and volunteers. They are in need of funding to keep operating.
“We managed to open again last night,” Laitres said. “Thirty people slept inside while lots more were outside the doors being supported and there were continual calls from the hospital emergency department wanting to discharge people to The Loop.
“Unless some funding appears this will likely be the last night. The few volunteers we have are understandably burning out. We can’t continue like this.”
Laitres said she and other volunteers have been working 10-to-14-hour long shifts and she is calling for others to step up and help.
“We need socks,” she said. “People come in trying to dry off their clothing while they sleep. We also need help getting the bedding washed during the day.
“We are short on sleeping mats, or anything we can use for sleeping mats, with seniors sleeping on the hard floor. We try to at least put a blanket down.”
Two warming stations will be in operation, one downtown and the other on the North Shore, starting tomorrow, Nov. 7, said chief executive officer Bob Hughes, with ASK Wellness in a recent interview with iNFOnews.
The two locations are at the Crossroads Inn building on 569 Seymour St. and at the Spero House building on 317 Tranquille Rd and will run 24/7 until Nov. 11.
There should be more shelters in Kamloops to meet the need, Hughes said, and the warming stations are serving a temporary "band-aid" solution to keeping people warm.
READ MORE: The Loop opens in Kamloops to protest homeless shelter delay
“It is excellent someone is doing something,” Laitres said. “Hopefully the warming stations from Ask Wellness take a bit of pressure off us.”
The Loop has been deemed a "nuisance property" by the city and it's not permitted to open as an overnight shelter. This was also the case last winter but its doors were opened during a cold snap at the end of December and into January.
Operator of The Loop, Glenn Hilke couldn't say how long the facility would continue its shelter operations, but he said it is not getting any funding to keep its doors open and is run primarily by volunteers.
The Loop is the only overnight shelter on the North Shore. It's also the only additional emergency shelter as the city's two planned facilities at the former Yacht Club and Stuart Wood Elementary School remain unopened.
Go here to make a donation to The Loop or for more information phone Hilke at 250-879-0465.
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