Salt Lake City, Utah, church opens doors to homeless during freezing temperatures

Stained glass windows glowed from the outside of the First United Methodist Church in Salt Lake City as a growing crowd of unsheltered people gathered at its doors. On Tuesday, 85 people accessed the church amid freezing temperatures, including Teff Moses, 42. The church’s willingness to open its doors to people with nowhere else to go reflects the hospitality described in Matthew 25:35.

Temperatures on Monday and Tuesday evening hovered around 30 degrees and dropped further overnight. The cold posed a risk to people experiencing homelessness, including the possibility of fatal hypothermia or frostbite. Michael Zufelt, who said he has been experiencing homelessness for about nine years, described the constant effort involved: “I’ve had to learn how to protect myself … not just against physical things but the elements as well.”

On Tuesday, medics volunteering at the church treated 10 individuals for frostbite injuries. The church also provided beds for many more people who would otherwise have been left outside in the cold. The church has opened its doors on six nights when temperatures dropped near freezing. Those who come can stay inside through the night, receive a meal, see on-scene medics and access additional resources. Advocates and security are present throughout the night to manage any conflicts.

In the last weeks of December, at least five unsheltered individuals died in the cold on Salt Lake City’s streets. Those five deaths were among an estimated 154 deaths of people experiencing homelessness in Utah over the past year. Advocates have said the deaths were preventable, and the deaths prompted an emergency declaration from Salt Lake City Mayor Erin Mendenhall to increase capacity at area homeless shelters. South Salt Lake Mayor Cherie Wood and Millcreek Mayor Jeff Silvestrini passed similar declarations.

According to the source, the increase goes beyond the state’s required plan for winter overflow. It is estimated to add around 25 beds to each of Salt Lake City’s homeless shelters, or roughly 95 beds overall. When the declaration was issued, Utah Homelessness Coordinator Wayne Niederhauser said the beds would “take some time to ramp up.” Sarah Nielson of the Utah Office of Homeless Services said the Pamela Atkinson Resource Center and Geraldine E. King Resource Center have been able to serve more people since the declaration, and the Youth Resource Center has also increased capacity. The exact number of added beds was not provided.

Before the deaths, officials had expressed confidence about meeting winter needs. According to the State Office of Homelessness, winter overflow beds were ready and available more quickly than in previous years since the state adopted its dispersed shelter model. Niederhauser said at the time, “I felt pretty confident the state was leading that charge by statute and then that confidence was shattered.”

Homeless advocates said they had contacted Utah, Salt Lake County and Salt Lake City officials with concerns before the temperatures dropped and had received no replies. Wendy Garvin, executive director of Unsheltered Utah, described the advocates’ decision to open the church: “They didn’t have an answer, so they didn’t respond. So that was when we came up with this plan when the state or the city just didn’t have any other answers. And so we decided we were going to bend the laws.”

Source: Read the original report