Shelter From the Storms : Weather Service Predictions Trigger Voucher Programs

It was cold enough in Long Beach, but not in Los Angeles. . . . With the National Weather Service predicting Monday overnight temperature readings in the low 40s for the beach city, nearly 100 homeless people were offered shelter there for three nights.

Los Angeles Civic Center temperatures, however, did not drop out of the 50s. So the year-old voucher-shelter system did not go into effect there. Not yet, at least.

“It looks like the rain may not set in until Thanksgiving Day,” countywide homeless coordinator Verta Nash said Tuesday. “It looks like it’s going to be a little cooler. I’ll have to talk to the weather people in the morning.”

Under both the Los Angeles city and the countywide programs, the homeless are given vouchers for hotel rooms or are sheltered in emergency centers when the weather service predicts temperatures of 40 degrees or less, or when the weather is going to be in the 50s with at least a 50% chance of rain.

But those predictions vary from community to community.

The city of Los Angeles, for example, operates its program in three areas--coastal, the Basin and the San Fernando Valley.

A three-day sheltering operation went into effect in the San Fernando Valley over last weekend, said Los Angeles city homeless projects coordinator Robert Vilmur, when the forecasters said Friday morning that the overnight temperature there would be 39 degrees.

The other two areas were not affected.

On Tuesday, with Long Beach in the second night of its three-day program, Los Angeles County’s “Cold Weather Hot Line” (800-548-6047) was informing prospective recipients that the Antelope Valley would also have shelter available.

In Long Beach, where the program is operated by Catholic Charities with the help of federal funds channeled through the county, 73 single people as well as six families were authorized to spend Monday night, Tuesday night and tonight in the California National Guard Armory at 7th Street and Martin Luther King Avenue.

Lupe Macker, San Pedro pastoral regional director for the church organization, said three mentally ill people and one disabled person were put up at a hotel.

Some of the homeless singles--perhaps 10 to 20--did not show up at the armory Monday night, Macker said. “We’re looking to find out why. Maybe they didn’t realize there was transportation. Or maybe they found something better.”