On nights like Tuesday, when the overnight low falls to the single digits, Evanston’s homeless are still very much on their own.
David Wengert, one of the organizers behind the new cold emergency shelter at St. Paul Lutheran Church, knows this, but said there’s not much he can do.
“We have a whole program that we run here during the day, and for us to have a staff member there at night, it’s very taxing on the program,” he said. “I mean, really, (Tuesday night) we should open, but we can’t.”
The center, located at 1004 Greenwood St., opened for the first time last month after close collaboration between the city, Connections for the Homeless and Interfaith Action of Evanston. But according to organizers, the staff isn’t large enough to keep the shelter open every night.
This means thresholds: St. Paul’s had to draw the line at blizzard situations, temperatures below zero or wind chills at minus 10.
It’s still an improvement, said Wengert, case manager for Connections for the Homeless. Last year, the requirement for opening the temporary emergency shelter was a 30 below zero wind chill, but it never reached that point, he said. With this winter’s rules, St. Paul’s opened five times in January alone, with an average of 20 people spending the night, Wengert said.
Connections for the Homeless has provided most of the staff on nights when the shelter is open. Target, Wal-Mart and the Hotel Orrington have donated bedding, and the city is supplying the cots, he said.
Beth Emet Synagogue, 1224 Dempster St., has agreed to serve as a backup location on nights when St. Paul’s cannot provide shelter. Several other congregations provide daytime warming centers and soup kitchens, but having one main nighttime shelter makes sense, Interfaith Action administrative director Susan Murphy said.
“What we wish we had is a center that we could open up every night,” Murphy said. “But if that was the case, we would have to have a facility that would cost money, that we would pay for. And we’d have to have a paid staff person that didn’t have to work during the day.”
Connections for the Homeless is working with the city to find grant money that will make the emergency shelter more sustainable, Wengert said. But for now, on nights when St. Paul’s is closed, the options are limited for Evanston’s homeless.
Hilda’s Place, a shelter run by Connections for the Homeless, has a small number of beds available on an emergency basis, and the Young Women’s Christian Association runs a shelter for victims of domestic violence.
For people with no bed to turn to, places like Burger King and the library become temporary refuges, Wengert said. He knows of homeless people who sleep on the El and others who travel as far as O’Hare International Airport for the night. Still others stay warm in emergency rooms and police stations.
“That’s hell for someone who’s outside,” he said. “But we don’t have a choice. We can’t open a shelter every time it’s going to be cold.”
St. Paul Lutheran is paying for the additional heating and electricity costs when the shelter is open. When pastor Sheri Delvin proposed the idea to the board, the response was a unanimous “yes.” Enthusiastic congregants offered to bring hot chocolate and other supplies, and some questioned whether the temperature threshold was too low, said Delvin, who is also president of Interfaith Action of Evanston.
But for a church with an aging building and just 150 members, the supply of time and money is limited.
“We have to have some cutoff,” Delvin said. “Otherwise, it would be an every-night shelter in the winter, and we couldn’t sustain that on a volunteer basis.”
The emergency shelter addresses a need that has existed for years, but the community can do better, Murphy said.
“What we need is a place where people can just come in and sleep, like what we’re doing,” she said. “But it would be ideal to have a building that we could open every night.”
