A city homeless shelter will keep its mens drop-in shelter open during May in response to the city denying extension of Occupy Madison’s permit.
At a press conference last Monday, Mayor Paul Soglin said the Occupy site on the 800 block of East Washington Avenue has evolved from a group of protestors to a community where the city’s homeless tend to congregate.
While the city and Occupy Madison originally agreed the site’s residents would disperse on April 30, some city officials requested a two-month extension to create more long-term solutions.
However, the city council voted on April 17 not to extend Occupy’s encampment permit, which prompted Porchlight to reopen its men’s Drop-In Shelter, according to Porchlight Executive Director Steven Schooler.
The Drop-In Shelter will re-open April 29 and extend through May 31. In addition, Porchlight will remove the normal 60-day limit on how many days a person can stay at the shelter.
“This is not intended to be the solution to all the issues surrounding the Occupy site that were raised, but we felt that it was a small thing we could do to offer a temporary respite against the consequences of the site being closed down,” Schooler said.
Schooler said Porchlight is continuing to work on more permanent solutions to homelessness like housing options with more treatment facilities.
Porchlight provides temporary emergency shelter to single men at its Drop-In Shelter and two overflow shelters at First United Methodist
