A temporary solution: Food & Shelter facility opens in downtown Norman

Norman’s temporary replacement for the city-run overnight emergency homeless shelter opens Tuesday.

Food & Shelter Inc.’s Friends House at the northwest corner of James Garner Avenue and Gray Street has 40 beds — 14 for women, 26 for men. It’s low-barrier, meaning it accepts unhoused people who don’t have identification, who have substance abuse problems and some who have criminal records.

It will stay open through the middle of March 2023, City Manager Darrel Pyle has said.

“In the short amount of time, we took a building that was used for a warehouse, that was filled with documents and file folders, and turned it into a shelter,” said Food & Shelter Inc. Director April Doshier.

Food & Shelter paid about $27,000 out of pocket for the beds — the city put $305,298 toward the shelter following an Oct. 11 council vote. The appropriation had wide support from council.

Councilors voted to put the money toward the temporary shelter after its previous warming shelter at 325 E. Comanche St. closed in June when the owner ended the contract with the city.

The closure followed months of debate over concerns that a proposed homeless shelter on the Griffin Memorial Hospital land at 900 E. Main St. would put sex offenders too close to Le Monde International School. Sex offenders would not have been allowed to stay in the shelter because it was located too close to schools and parks under state law.

The land at Griffin was reclaimed by the state at the end of April to sell for development.

After the closure, volunteers with Norman Care-A-Vans, a group that assists with transportation needs for unhoused people, sat with unhoused people in protest in the city hall foyer.

“How would you like to sleep out in the cold, in the winter, in case it got real cold? No, you wouldn’t appreciate it,” Mark Pipkin, an unhoused man, said at the Oct. 11 meeting.

Food & Shelter and Salvation Army both submitted requests for proposals to build overnight homeless shelters with the city. Salvation Army currently has an overnight shelter, but it’s not low-barrier.

Doshier said Friends House was a more urgent request.

“Six weeks ago, the city contacted me and said, ‘We need something for winter, so can we work on a temporary solution?’ and that’s how this building came about,” she said.

Friends House now consists of two sleeping rooms separated by a hallway. The hallway has rooms for people using the shelter to store their things.

Doshier said she’s currently looking for activities for people using the shelter to pass the time.

While Doshier is happy with the new facility, she says it’s not a permanent solution for homelessness in Norman. Rarchar Tortorello, Ward 5 city councilor, agreed, and said he wants more permanent solutions to help people out of homelessness in the city.

But Tortorello, who expressed concerns over the Griffin property, said he still understands the need. He said the need for a temporary shelter is “a compassion issue,” and that “we don’t want people to die on the streets.”

Doshier said Friends House is “the beginning.” She said Food & Shelter is looking to purchase land nearby its headquarters, 201 Reed Ave., for a permanent overnight shelter.