Community meeting provides update on sheltering homeless

Cape Girardeau community members participated in a virtual meeting Thursday, Nov. 30, hosted by the United Way of Southeast Missouri to give input on how to provide funding and volunteers for the temporary overnight sheltering of the homeless during extreme winter weather.

On Nov. 20, four organizations -- UWSEMO, the Salvation Army of Cape Girardeau, Community Partnership of Southeast Missouri and First Call for Help -- presented a comprehensive winter sheltering plan to the Cape Girardeau City Council, which requested the city allocate $10,000 to fund overnight sheltering in the Salvation Army and hotel stays for homeless citizens during freezing weather. The council voted against the proposal.

Elizabeth Shelton, executive director of UWSEMO, said Thursday's virtual meeting was scheduled as a result of "many members of the community" who contacted her expressing interest in helping to raise the money and volunteer where needed.

"I'm delighted to say that even though the City Council said no, we've had other people in our community really step-up and this call is an indication of that," Shelton said of the virtual meeting.

Shelton said she was encouraged and thankful for everyone who attended the virtual meeting. She asked the attendees to "embrace the reality" that the issue could not be solved in one meeting and that more conversations would be needed in the future.

"This gives all of us an opportunity to be educated and to educate our community," Shelton said. "However, it will take time because it's just not an easy thing for us to make happen."

Shelton said many organizations have been working on "tackling this conundrum" of how to help the homeless overnight during terrible weather for several years. She said getting the proposal before the City Council was the furthest they had gotten so far and thanked Mayor Stacy Kinder for helping them get to that point.

As to the need for volunteers to open the Salvation Army shelter, Shelton said one issue is training volunteers to take on roles such as shelter managers and to be in charge of food distribution and safety. She said these volunteers need to go through a four-hour training program. However, this being the Salvation Army's busiest time of the year providing a Thanksgiving meal and its Red Kettle campaign, it doesn't have the time or personnel to conduct training sessions until after December.

Shelton informed the meeting's attendees that in the short term they will continue to house people in need in hotel rooms, using funding from the Emergency Food and Shelter programs, churches and individuals. She said they have set up a website where people can donate to help cover the costs and, as of Thursday afternoon, nearly $4,000 of a $10,000 goal had been raised.

The link to the donation site is https://unitedwayofsemo.harnessgiving.org/campaigns/13036.

Shelton said CPSEMO is operating as the central hub to place people in shelters as well as provide them with any additional resources they need. She said CPSEMO will also take in donations of blankets, clothing and food.

CPSEMO can be contacted at (573) 651-3747, online at www.cpsemo.org or at its location at 40 S. Sprigg St. in Cape Girardeau.

Suggestions made by meeting attendees included inquiring about the use of the Osage Centre, the Shawnee Park Center and a community meeting room at the Cape Girardeau Police Station. Others made suggestion of possible fundraising events and venues.

Shelton thanked them for their suggestions and said they would all be looked into. She said they would also be researching what other communities are doing and try to model their efforts on those successes.

She said future meetings would be scheduled and advertised soon.

"We will continue to explore other emergency shelter solutions, fundraising ideas and other possible long-term solutions," Shelton said.