City hall could shelter homeless at night: mayor

Calgary's mayor says city hallcould be usedastemporary lodging for homeless people left in the cold, snowy streets at night becauseoverwhelmed shelters are full.

"We're looking at a number of situations to ensure that no one does freeze at night and that includes …looking at all city facilities as an emergency temporary type facility," he said Wednesday.

"Everything from using a transit facility, using a parking garage, maybe even using city hall."

One Calgaryshelter, called the Calgary Drop-In Centre, is closing its doors on up to 100 people a night.

"I can see problems arising from this, even maybe deaths," said Paul Jorgensen, who slept outside wrapped in a blanket after he was turned away from a shelter one night recently.

City officials plan to renovate the empty Brick store building on 16th Avenue in the northeast part of the city and operate it as a shelterfrom December to March.

In the meantime, Debbie Newman of the Drop-in Centre says police should be pulling the homeless off the snowy streets at night and letting them sleep in holding cells.

However, Calgary police say they aren't considering that option because those cells are for people who have broken the law or are intoxicated.

'Almost had a riot outside'

On Tuesday afternoon, every seat in the centre was full and people were lying on the hallway floor.

Les MacIntyre, a construction worker who is not working right now because of an injury, spends his days at the Calgary Drop-In Centre, but has been sleeping outside in a tent at night.

MacIntyre calls the situation very serious.

"Eight o'clock the night before they were full and they almost had a riot outside," he said.

"It's pretty bad. A lot of people got frostbite. People will be just even under a jacket, huddled up in a snow drift or on the edge of the river. I've seen that.

"Anywhere they can to get out of the wind."

At night, dozens of people are huddling in groups along the sidewalk near the shelter and under a nearby bridge to keep warm, another homeless man told CBC News.

"You had one guy out here this morning. Had no shoes on. Bare feet. You could see his feet were almost black."

Staff fear violence

The situation has staff at the Calgary Drop-in Centre on edge.

Newman says for many of them closing the doors in below-zero temperatures is heartbreaking, and she worries the situation is becoming dangerous.

"You obviously have people who will get into fights. They do become violent. Any situation that is going to put people's lives in jeopardy is going to create a lot of unrest and uncertainty."

Newman says every time the centre turns away people, workers call police and emergency services.

Teen drop-in centre opened

On Wednesday, Bronconnierwas at theopening ofa downtown storefront program for homelessyouth located on 7 Avenue S.E.Exit Outreach, run by Wood's Homes,provides meals andcounsellingto young people, who can also shower anddo laundry.

Organizations that work with the homeless say there aren't enough shelter beds in Calgary because of the number of people flooding into the city to look for work.

The province's super-heated economy has sent housing prices soaring and the rental vacancy rate has dropped so low that even some people with full-time jobs have been sleeping in their cars or on mats in shelters.