THUNDER BAY – In just its first month this winter the Shelter House’s cold weather program is picking up where it left off.
The Street Outreach Services program, which was introduced last year as a one-year pilot project, was re-launched earlier this month and is already seeing an increase since it was stopped in April.
“Towards the end of the program last year we were averaging about 13 transports per day. This year the average is a little higher,” Shelter House operations manager Doug Forbes said.
“In some busy days we’re doing up to 20 transports per day.”
Those numbers are only expecting to rise as cold temperatures begin to set in after an unseasonably mild December.
The program has a two-person team respond to non-violent calls through the city and can provide transportation between shelters or if necessary to the hospital.
That helps divert calls that would otherwise be going to emergency services, freeing up their resources.
The SOS teams also visit encampments to offer food or warm clothing to those braving the cold.
“We’re giving out about 30 to 50 sandwiches per day and we suspect now that some cold weather is upon us the demand will be ever increasing,” Forbes said.
That service is expected to be needed heavily throughout the winter, considering two of the city’s primary shelters are operating to their maximum capacity.
Forbes said the Shelter House is regularly running full and that the Salvation Army is in a severe overflow situation.
Having both facilities in that state makes it more difficult to house people during cold winter nights.
“It puts a little more pressure on us because it takes an option off the table for the Shelter House. At times where we’re full we’re able to call over there and they can accept some of our clients. With them at capacity that option is no longer there,” Forbes said.
The program has received $50,000 each from the both the Thunder Bay District Social Services Administration Board as well as city council.
