After weeks of uncertainty, the city of Wichita and HumanKind Ministries announced a final plan for an emergency winter shelter for unhoused people this year.
The new emergency shelter will be at the former Fundamental Learning Center near 21st and Grove. The city-owned building can sleep up to 250 people and will accept single men and women. Families will be redirected to a different HumanKind shelter.
The city plans to use $685,000 of its COVID relief funds to help HumanKind pay for the emergency shelter’s operational needs, like staffing, security and equipment. The City Council will vote on the funds Tuesday. HumanKind is also providing $200,000 for operations.
But city and nonprofit leaders say they don’t have a firm date on when the new shelter will open.
“To facilitate things like transportation, buying beds, buying mattresses, buying blankets – all that's going to take time,” said Assistant City Manager Troy Anderson. “Our guess is that's probably going to take about three weeks to acquire all the equipment and things necessary to outfit the facility.
“So realistically, we're probably talking end of November, first of December.”
In years past, HumanKind opened its emergency winter shelter Nov. 1. But the former emergency shelter building – at 841 N. Market – had infrastructure issues and could only serve about 100 people this year, despite a higher need.
The number of people in Wichita experiencing homelessness increased 18% in the past five years. And last year, the shelter served 188 people on its peak night, Mayor Brandon Whipple said.
The city learned in August it would need another emergency shelter. Since then, city officials said they have been seeking alternative building options for a winter shelter.
In a news conference Thursday, HumanKind announced that it would only operate the new emergency winter shelter near 21st and Grove and not the former one downtown.
“We are pleased to announce we will devote 100% of our winter shelter resources to operating this new emergency winter shelter,” said LaTasha St. Arnault, president/CEO of HumanKind Ministries.
City officials said they are considering a free bus route from downtown to the shelter to help transport people to the facility.
“There’s also talk of possibly utilizing our shuttles as well,” Whipple said. “We also understand that some of our nonprofit partners have vans and shuttles as well.”
The shelter will operate 24 hours a day, seven days a week until the end of March. It will offer three meals a day and have 24/7 security personnel, Whipple said.
It will also be a “no-barrier” shelter, meaning “they won’t turn anyone away for any reasons,” St. Arnault said. She added that HumanKind is working with other nonprofits to bring in services like behavioral health care to the facility.
“Our goal is to have several nonprofit organizations that are administering services that our clients can benefit from to be inside the facility with dedicated office space,” St. Arnault said. “The city of Wichita, the housing department, they’ll be on site as well.”
Until the emergency winter shelter opens, people needing shelter services should continue to reach out to other service providers, Anderson said.
“We had a little bit of a cold spell for these past several days,” he said. “The temperatures will remain fairly mild in November, which will work in our favor.”
