Eugene (KMTR) - With winter arriving, preparations are underway to reopen Eugene warming centers for homeless people.
The Egan Memorial Warming Centers will open to homeless men, women and children whenever temperatures drop below 28 degrees. The plan is to keep it available until the end of March in order to keep people warm and dry.
Terry McDonald, the local director of the St. Vincent DePaul Society addresses the need bluntly: “The life expectancy on the street in the winter in this community is not high."
It is a fact nonprofits and churches want to change by providing a place for people to go when the temperatures get low.
"That's of course one of the basic requirements of a civilized society, is that people will be cared for no matter what their economic or social level, and that they will be kept safe," McDonald says.
The plan is for churches and other organizations to open their doors on sub-freezing.
McDonald says, “Those faith communities anticipate really trying to form a warm, homey type of atmosphere for people coming in to a distressed situation."
"Hard to imagine that people are out there all night almost every night; that they're having to deal with that cold,” says Roxann Obrien, director of the Lindholm Service Center. “We can go in and snuggle up under a warm blanket, but not them. They're on the wet ground or they're walking around to stay warm."
St. Vincent DePaul estimates they hand out 5,000 blankets a year. Of the 50 that came in last week, all are now gone.
And the need continues to grow, says McDonald. “Already, the need for blankets and bedrolls and tarps—especially tarps to keep people dry—is really critical. And that, along with warm socks and warm mittens and hats, these things we're burning through really at a rapid pace."
Organizers hope the Egan Warming Centers will house 50 to 70 people, but they're wondering just how many people are still in need, because of an increase in the number of so-called invisible homeless, such as car campers and couch surfers.
