Armory to Take In Homeless : Weather: Social workers expect most of the Oxnard facility’s 100 beds to be used on cold nights.

The Oxnard National Guard Armory will be opened as a shelter for the county’s homeless population on cold and rainy nights starting Friday, the County Board of Supervisors ordered Tuesday.

The board’s decision was welcomed by representatives of social agencies that provide shelter to the county’s estimated 4,000 to 6,000 homeless. In recent weeks, officials have been forced to double room occupancy or turn people away.

This will be the third year in a row that the armory has been opened to the homeless. After an unusually mild winter last year, during which the armory averaged 59 guests per night, social workers said they expect most of the armory’s 100 beds to be occupied this year as temperatures drop near freezing.

“It’s going to be colder this time, so we expect a lot more people,” said Staff Sgt. Daniel Quolos, night manager at the armory.

For armory doors to open, the temperature must drop to 40 degrees or below, or less than 50 degrees with a 50% chance of rain. The building in the 300 block of South K Street will be open until March 31.

The county’s decision follows authorization by Gov. George Deukmejian to use National Guard armories throughout the state as temporary shelters.

If weather conditions are met, the armory will be open from 7 p.m. to 7:30 a.m. and the homeless will be given dinner and a small breakfast, said Nancy Steinhelper, deputy director of the County Department of Social Services.

The armory shelter will cost about $53,000 to operate, Steinhelper said. The county will provide $29,000 and the rest will be paid by donations from a group of private and nonprofit organizations including the American Red Cross, which has managed the program since its inception.

While the shelter offers partitioned bed space for women and children, most of its users are men, Steinhelper said. Unlike the two year-round shelters operating in the county--one of which specializes in homeless families, the other in drug and alcohol rehabilitation programs--the armory has traditionally served the more transient segment of the homeless population, Steinhelper said.

“Most of them are single men, and we don’t force them to do anything,” she said. “The only rules are that no weapons, alcohol or drugs are allowed.”

For the first time, however, the Red Cross workers will provide social services and counseling on a voluntary basis. Also, this year the Red Cross will add a full-time coordinator and divide supervisorial duties among two crews so that workers are more rested to meet the needs of the homeless, said Martha Ruth Lefevre, Red Cross director of emergency services.

“This year we’re trying something new because it’s not easy to to manage a shelter,” Lefevre said. “It’s very hard to get any rest because people wander in at all hours of the night.”

The armory’s opening will bring much-needed relief to the other shelters, where bed space has all but disappeared after a week of cold, windy nights with temperatures dipping below 40.

The Oxnard Rescue Mission, with 50 beds for homeless substance abusers, has been full for the past three nights and several people have been turned away, Assistant Director Carl Roberg said.

“We’re very, very happy” about the armory shelter’s opening, Roberg said. “We don’t like turning people away, and this will help considerably with the overflow.”

The Oxnard-based Zoe Christian Center also has been stretched thin by increased housing demands.

Normally a 150-bed facility, the center is housing more than 160 homeless families already--including an increasing number of migrant workers out of work since the fall harvest season ended, Director Jim Gilmore said.

Gilmore said the armory shelter would help meet the needs of the homeless this winter, but more help from private groups and individuals also will be needed.

“It’s going to be a tough winter,” he said, “and the homeless shelters will need help. We need blankets, canned foods, volunteers. There are people out there who don’t even have a blanket to wrap around themselves.”

Times staff writer Santiago O’Donnell contributed to this story.