Homeless Fill Armory as Temperature Drops : Shelter: Freezing weather brought a record number of people to the Salvation Army’s facility in the Inglewood National Guard Armory.

Vicente Figueroa knows what it is to be cold. He knows the creeping sensation as cold invades first his fingers and then his arms and then his neck. He knows that on cold and rainy nights, he is small enough to curl up inside a garbage bag to stay dry, if not warm.

During the worst of last week’s freezing weather, however, Figueroa got to stay inside something a lot warmer than a garbage bag.

Figueroa, 31, joined more than 80 other men and a handful of women Thursday night at the Inglewood National Guard Armory, where the Salvation Army provided each with a cot, a hygiene kit, basic medical care and a hot meal.

Crowded and impersonal as it was, it was far better than another frigid night on the streets.

“What else would we want?” Figueroa asked, as the South Bay’s only cold weather shelter program opened for its 12th night this winter. “We got everything here. Good people. Food. A shower . . . I hate sleeping on the streets, man.”

Figueroa has been on the streets for more than two years, ever since the Redondo Beach restaurant where he worked as a cook burned to the ground, leaving him without a job. Some of his friends have been homeless for a lot longer than that.

If there were shelters available every night, they would stay in them, they said. As it is, they are grateful for the help they do get when the mercury dips its lowest.

Mary Agnes Erlandson, program site coordinator at St. Margaret’s Center in Lennox, said the $600,000 countywide program springs from a very basic concept.

“This is primarily to save lives,” Erlandson said. “When the weather is this cold, people’s lives are at extreme risk. We attempt to shelter everyone . . . but no one sees this as any kind of real (long-term) solution.”

Under the rules of the 3-year-old cold weather program, any of six National Guard armories scattered throughout the county are opened to the homeless when forecasters predict that temperatures in the immediate area will dip below 40 degrees, or below 50 degrees if there is a 50% chance of rain.

Whereas armories in the San Fernando and San Gabriel valleys remain open almost continuously in mid-winter, conditions at the Inglewood armory--which joined the program just a few months ago--have met the requirements only the 12 times.

The county has set up a toll-free hot line--(800) 548-6047--to tell people which shelters are open. Decisions are based on weather forecasts released at 11 a.m. each day.

Activists for the homeless say they are frustrated by the strict nature of the regulations.

“If it’s supposed to be 42 or 41 (degrees), no, we’re not open,” said Lt. Lee Lescano from the Salvation Army’s Inglewood branch. “There is no wind chill factored into that. . . . But once we’re activated, we’re open for three nights, regardless of weather. At least there is some consistency there.”

When the program first began, workers said it was difficult to attract the area’s homeless.

“The ones who live in Alondra Park, they’ve been there a long time and, unfortunately, that is . . . their home,” Lescano said. “Unless it’s real cold or they’re real hungry, this is not something they seek out.”

Erlandson, whose center sends a bus to several area parks to help people get to the armory, said the homeless initially were wary about getting on board.

“They didn’t like getting on this strange bus when they were unsure about where they were being taken,” she said. “Now we have a little more trust.”

The program has quickly swelled from an initial response of about 20 people each night to more than 50 now.

Most of those who come to the Inglewood armory are from the Hawthorne-Lawndale-Lennox area. Homeless people from the harbor area tend to use an armory in Long Beach, according to a spokeswoman for the hot line.

Recently, the Inglewood armory also began taking overflow people from the West Hollywood area, Lescano said. On Thursday night, the armory provided sleeping quarters for 89 people, a record for the site.

The mood in the armory was almost festive as the group arrived, many bundled in blankets, their faces obscured by knit caps pulled low over their ears. They eagerly selected their beds for the night, claiming them by writing their names on a piece of masking tape affixed to each cot.

High-spirited laughter could be heard in the back where many people were enjoying their first hot shower in days. Some came shuffling back from the showers wearing ragged robes and flip-flop sandals, grinning broadly.

While one group watched “Apocalypse Now” on a television in the corner, others pitched in to help serve the evening meal--canned ravioli and slices of white bread.

For newlyweds Vincent and Deanna Deloney, it was the first hot meal in days and a chance for Deanna to begin recovering from a nagging respiratory infection.

The couple, married last month, said they have been on the streets since Vincent was laid off from his janitorial job two months ago.

Both said they have been trying desperately to find work.

“It’s this big circle because you have to have experience for everything, but nobody wants to give you a chance to get that experience,” Deanna said.

She said county welfare workers “have an attitude when you go in there, like you’re not trying or something. I wish they could be put one day in our shoes, and then they would change their minds, fast.”

At 10 p.m., program workers told the crowd it was time to turn out the lights.

For once, the exhausted men and women could sleep without fear, safe from the nighttime violence of the streets. But as they drifted into seven hours of welcome oblivion, they knew their respite would be only temporary.

All that the morning promised was a bowl of oatmeal and a quick bus ride back to the streets.