CHAPEL HILL -- The Inter-Faith Council for Social Service may be going back to the drawing board – at least to reconsider its role as a provider of emergency shelter services in Orange County.
Several town council members asked the IFC to consider removing a 17-cot emergency shelter component from its proposal to expand and relocate their Community House men’s transitional housing program out of downtown Monday.
“We challenge you to see if you can do that. It would be a phenomenal statement; one that I think would cause rejoicing throughout our entire community. So that is my request of the applicant,“ said Councilmember Matt Czajkowksi.
“There is a lot of work that needs to be done between now and when it does come back,” Councilmember Laurin Easthom said of IFC’s proposal. Easthom agreed with Czjakowski’s request to remove the 17-cot part of the proposal.
The 17-cot emergency shelter has been a major source of discord among proponents of the IFC’s proposal and neighbors of the site, who say the plan would concentrate too many social services in one area and is too close to preschools and parks.
The IFC wants to build a 52-bed transitional facility and 17-cot emergency shelter at 1315 Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard off of Homestead Road. The facility would include clinic and office space and would replace the group’s shelter on Rosemary Street downtown.
Chapel Hill needs services to support the homeless, but the council wants more collaboration with other nonprofits and neighbors
“The IFC has done such an amazing job trying to empty the sea with a teaspoon for a very long time,” said Councilmember Donna Bell. “If there is a way to put pressure on other entities to take up some of this programmatic work, this is a programmatic shift by putting an expiration date on those beds, I would be in support of that.”
The Planning Board and several citizen advisory boards have recommended approval. The IFC has agreed to draft a Good Neighbor Plan, outlining procedures for responding to neighbors’ concerns and working with police.
Councilmembers said the SUP should require a Good Neighbor Plan that can be include mechanisms for enforcement and any future changes to the surrounding area.
“I think it’s really important to make sure that the Good Neighbor Plan is a part of the SUP, we owe it to the neighbors,” Easthom said.
The new shelter would offer a transitional facility to help men move toward independent living and also provide separate overnight shelter for up to 17 men. The men using the overnight shelter would be screened for drugs and alcohol and transported to and from the facility each day.
Sex offenders would not be allowed to use the facility because of the site’s proximity to a park and other places where children gather.
About 200 people attended the hearing, more than 40 spoke, and comments on the plan were split. Residents packed the Town Council chamber and two overflow rooms Monday night to debate the proposed site of a new men’s homeless shelter.
Opponents said the site was chosen without public input and driven by university and business interests that want to move the current men’s homeless shelter out of downtown Chapel Hill. The proposed site in northern Chapel Hill is owned by the university, which would lease it to the town.
“What I don’t understand is how external pressures can override common sense,” resident Tim CoyneSmith said. “I ask you when you take a look at all the evidence that has been submitted and when you’re deliberating on evidence to put aside those external pressures.”
Many residents were concerned about the emergency shelter, which would not screen men for drugs or alcohol. The men using the overnight shelter would be screened based on behavior and transported to and from the facility each day.
The IFC says it needs a new site to better respond to an increasing need for its services in the county.
Several members of the group’s Board of Directors spoke in support of the plan, along with student volunteers at Community House and residents of the shelter.
"I was there for nine months. I lost my house, I lost my wife...nobody on the streets would help; the staff at IFC, they provided me a home," said David Smith, a former resident at Community House. "I know at least 20 people that turned themselves around, you never hear the good things the numbers tell," Smith said.
The IFC partners with about 60 congregations in the Chapel Hill area to provide hunger relief and housing assistance. One in five people are poor in Orange County, executive director Chris Moran said.
Representatives from the IFC’s team said the shelter would not hurt property values.
“Poverty is the real challenge in our community and most communities in the United States,” Moran said. “Hunger, homelessness and poverty is interlinked all the time; this is very important.”
The council has scheduled another public hearing on the IFC SUP for May 9.
