What happened to Sebastopol’s warming centers?
Warming centers are a good—and potentially life-saving—idea. Should Sebastopol run its own or just transport those in need to warming centers elsewhere?
It’s been an unusually cold winter in Sebastopol—with nighttime temperatures in the 30s and intermittent rain, hail, and even, briefly, that rarest of all phenomenon—snow. It’s the sort of weather that makes one grateful for a warm bed and a roof over one’s head—and that inevitably brings up thoughts of those who lack both.
How are the unsheltered faring during this cold and rainy weather, and what, if anything, is the city doing about it?
Back in December, when temperatures nosedived, the city of Sebastopol set up a warming center at the Sebastopol Community Cultural Center. A handful of unsheltered individuals showed up to escape the cold.
“On most nights, there were only six to 10 people who showed up from what we think are probably about maybe 20 to 25 people who were car camping or somehow sleeping rough,” said Arthur George, chair of an ad hoc volunteer group called West County Homeless Advocates. He was one of the volunteers at Sebastopol’s warming center in December.
But that December warming center was a one-off. Despite the continuing frigid weather, the city hasn’t managed to set up another one.
Councilmember Diana Rich was frank about this: “The City is not able to pull together the necessary pieces—venue, staffing, etc. We got it done in December, but that was a struggle, and honestly happened thanks to the kindness of volunteers.”
The fire department has a tiny budget for warming and cooling centers—enough to provide food, drinks and blankets for participants—but not enough to pay for staff.
“Our biggest challenge simply is just being able to staff a warming center and open it,” Fire Chief Jack Piccinini said.
Piccinini said an effort was made to open a warming center during the freeze in February—the Sebastopol Community Cultural Center offered its building—but that effort was abandoned when the city couldn’t muster enough volunteers to staff it.
In the absence of a city warming center, the task of making sure unsheltered people didn’t freeze to death fell, as these things often do, to the police.
“We are fortunate that we have a safety net: our police officers will transport anyone who is in need to the Caritas Warming Center [in Santa Rosa],” Councilmember Rich said. “Chief Nelson confirmed that policy with me. His officers are ready and willing. It’s a longstanding offer that our homeless support agencies and advocates know about.”
Arthur George said the homeless are welcome to come into the lobby of the police station. The police will then transport them to a warming center in Santa Rosa no questions asked.
“They're not out to bust people for being high or anything like that,” George said. “They're truly trying to serve.”
A representative from the Sebastopol Police confirmed that the department had had “a few, but not many” people take them up on this offer. (They didn’t have a precise number.)
The task of creating a new plan for warming and cooling centers in Sebastopol, including whether to have them or not, is now a part of Chief Piccinini’s very long to-do list. (The job has fallen to him because, as the new interim Fire Chief, he is also the head of the city’s emergency services.)
“I think we still have some work to do on how to coordinate this, in terms of each city making independent decisions on whether warming centers are required or not,” Piccinini said. “We have more work to do to really refine criteria and the protocols.”
Until those plans are made, the city will rely on stop-gap measures like the police and, Piccinini noted, local churches.
“We rely heavily on churches,” he said. “Sebastopol Christian and the Community Church of Sebastopol in particular. They tend to take the initiative to open up, and it's almost honestly better served when they do it. They have a good group of core volunteers, and they can offer coffee and snacks and they feed them in the morning. They get really involved in that and provide a great service.”
In the short term, the question of how (or whether) to provide warming centers for the unsheltered is about to become moot. Spring is just ten rainy days away, which gives Chief Piccinini and the Sebastopol City Council eight more months to solve this dilemma.