Fire, or ice?

I had lunch with a ministry colleague today. We’ve known of each other for a long while, but had never taken time to just sit down and talk.

His church is struggling right now because, as the saying goes, “no good deed goes unpunished.” Because our local homeless shelters will soon be full to overflowing, his downtown congregation had decided to offer its gym as overflow space through these winter months.

After much work to prepare the space, they were told by inspectors that they must have a sprinkler system installed in order to be approved as a shelter. Ironically, the current shelters don’t have sprinklers, but since this is a new usage, they are being asked to adhere to new standards.

It would all be funny if it weren’t so sad. Basically, officials are saying these folks are safer sleeping outside than in a building without a sprinkler system. I’m not sure those in need of shelter would agree that trying to sleep in 20 degree weather under an overpass would be more dangerous than a warm, secure gym. The church had arranged for volunteers who would remain awake during the night, all exits would be continually lit, and no smoking is allowed. That doesn’t sound like a very dangerous situation to me.

As if the building guidelines snafu wasn’t sad enough, the families bringing children to the church’s day care also registered some serious complaints about their children being “exposed” to the homeless. Fear ran rampant; there were concerns about airborne diseases, AIDS, overall safety, etc. Of course, those staying overnight would be released before the children began arriving. Were parents afraid of their children seeing homeless people - in a church?

Maybe both the government’s and the parents’ responses are the same in one regard; both parties would like to just make the homeless disappear. Neither group seems to be very interested in getting to the heart of the reasons for homelessness. They simply don’t wish to be inconvenienced by having to deal with them at all.