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Questions surround new location for Warming Place

By G. Michael Dobbs

Managing Editor



SPRINGFIELD Domenic Sarno looked down the sidewalk from the South End Community Center on Howard Street towards the Zanetti School last Thursday. A group of children from the school were coming to the center for a program and Sarno, the executive director of the center, greeted many of them by name as they entered the building.

Sarno, who is also a member of the City Council, said that children such as these are the reason he is concerned about placing The Warming Place homeless shelter at St. Joseph Church on Howard Street.

Last week, Springfield Mayor Charles Ryan announced that the city would issue a Request for Proposal to organizations that would compete to run the Warming Place from July 1 to March 1, 2006. The Open Pantry and three city churches have operated the Warming Place. They have provided the homeless with another shelter option besides the shelter on Worthington Street operated by Friends of the Homeless, Inc. The closing of The Warming Place last spring brought forth the "Tent City" that housed the homeless for the summer.

Kevin Noonan, executive director of The Open Pantry, worked with the Diocese of Springfield in finding the St. Joseph location.

Sarno is willing to give the shelter an opportunity, but he is concerned about the long-term plan for helping the homeless.

"We have to start looking long term," he told Reminder Publications and said the solution should be a regional rather than a city approach.

"I'm sick and tired of Springfield being a dumping ground," he added. Sarno believes that, since many of the homeless come from other neighboring communities, those communities should contribute to the support of homeless services.

He expressed concern about the economic impact of the concentration of homeless on the South End.

The church is at the corner of Howard Street and Columbus Avenue and is slated for closing on June 26. The shelter will be in the basement where the legal occupancy is 400 people. There are lavatories for both men and women adjoining the basement area. There is a stage in the basement and an area with a coffee pot, microwave, and a refrigerator. Whether or not these appliances will remain is not certain.

Noonan told Reminder Publications on Friday that if The Open Pantry is appointed the agency to run the shelter, the plan is to bring in cots, rather than put mattresses on the floor, for better air circulation. The basement area would be divided into two areas: one that would be for people who are sober and one that would be for people who arrive intoxicated. Then each section would be divided between men and women.

The use of the church is designed to provide a needed service until a more permanent solution can be found, Ryan said at a press conference on Wednesday. Ryan said that there is an "innate cruelty" in not having a facility that could provide services during the day as well as the evening.

Ryan announced that Friends of the Homeless would be receiving a grant to help develop a master plan for services to the homeless. The goal is to write that plan within 30 to 60 days, he added.

"We're in a race," Ryan said, alluding to the temporary nature of the St. Joseph site for the Warming Place.

During the press conference, Noonan asked why The Open Pantry was being told they had to apply to run their own program. He did not get an answer from Ryan or the city officials gathered.

After the conference, Noonan explained to Reminder Publications that The Open Pantry and the city have split the operating cost of the Warming Place and added that his agency apparently did not receive any allocation from the city in current federal Emergency Shelter Grant funding.

"There is just no reason for this [behavior from the city]," he said.

He said he thinks that Ryan is positioning the Friends of the Homeless shelter as being "one stop shopping" for homeless services, a concept with which Noonan does not agree.