This winter and its stubborn insistence on hanging on is causing concern for Samaritan House’s safe and warm shelter for homeless, which so far has provided a total of 1325 bed nights to 125 individuals over the past approximately four months.
Typically the shelter operates for the winter season, opening November 1 and closing at the end of March. The month of February is about to go out on forgettable terms with overnight lows into next week forecast by Environment Canada to be as low as -25, or nine to ten degrees colder than normal which would point toward continued demand for shelter from the weather well into the coming month and perhaps pushing up against that intended end of March closure for the shelter.
According to Samaritan House Ministries Executive Director John Jackson the cost to operate the shelter is approximately $600 per day or the equivalent of 25 staff hours. Funding for the five months that it is open comes from a combination of BNRC federal grant as well as contributions from the City and United Way. Though the successful Coldest Night of the Year walk this past weekend exceeded its $25k fundraising goal by almost $7k it’s said that the shelter is not fully-funded and that any idea of keeping it open longer than March 31 under continued abnormal outdoor conditions would rely on food bank funds.
Jackson says there is no specific associated funding request and that intent is to brainstorm and initiate conversation that may lead to ideas and solutions.
In all the weather talk, forecasters appear optimistic that this sub-normal stretch of temps has an end in sight. According to a spring forecast released by The Weather Network this week there’s an expectation for a pattern change in March that could lead to above normal weather by the end of the month… though in a story in today’s Brandon Sun a Weather Network meteorologist is quoted as saying that locally we may have to wait until as late as early April before seeing a rapid warmup.