Written by Savannah Jones

MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — With temperatures consistently below freezing this winter, many members of the unhoused community are left without shelter for several hours of the day due to staffing issues at the city’s emergency shelters.

Morgantown is home to several shelters for the homeless, including Hazel’s House of Hope. The facility houses Grace Shelter, an emergency overnight shelter; the Salvation Army Day Center, which provides meals and socialization opportunities for those in the unhoused community; and a warming shelter.

The Grace Shelter and Warming Shelter, newly operated by Catholic Charities after the closure of Bartlett Housing Solutions this summer, is currently open from 8 p.m. to 8 a.m.

The Salvation Army Day Center typically accounts for the hours during the day that the Grace Shelter is closed but can currently only operate from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.

This leaves a seven-hour gap in service to the community.

According to Monongalia County Commission President and Morgantown Community Resources (MCR) Board Member Jeff Arnett, the gaps in open hours are caused by a lack of trained volunteers and staff.

“There were volunteers that were overseeing the day [center] during those hours that we mentioned that there was a gap. That became an issue with MCR for liability reasons as the volunteers weren’t trained,” he said on WAJR’s “Talk of the Town.”

In an attempt to ease the issue, a Morgantown man took matters into his own hands, opening his own makeshift warming shelter to account for the hours during the day when no shelters are open, according to Arnett.

“A local businessman offered a building that he had with no agenda other than just out of the kindness of his heart to get these people off the street. I believe his exact quote, at least to me, was ‘I wouldn’t want my family members outside in that,’” he said.

This shelter could not remain open, as the man did not undergo the proper permit process to house the individuals.

“He just opened up his doors, not really realizing the process probably, but it was genuinely a charitable thing to do,” Arnett said. “It did create an issue, so MCR started working toward a solution.”

For now, Arnett said Project Rainbow’s Rainbow House is providing services during the hours Hazel’s House of Hope cannot remain open. Arnett said he is unsure about the facility’s training protocol, but the shelter has many volunteers and paid staff members to accommodate the unhoused community.

In November, a former Rainbow House employee brought forth several allegations against the facility at a Monongalia County Commission meeting, saying she was wrongly terminated and alleging that poor security at the facility allowed for open drug use and drug dealing.

The Commission called on the West Virginia Commission to End Homelessness to investigate the allegations. Arnett did not have any new information on the investigation.

Arnett said MCR hopes more staff members can be trained to either open the warming shelter up to its full hours or extend the Day Center’s hours to accommodate those the warming shelter cannot cover.

As of now, the warming shelter will only operate until March 15.

“[The Monongalia County Commission] provided funding to Catholic Charities, along with the city, to keep the warming shelter open up through March 15th. The hope is that we will have a much longer-term solution to that in the coming months as to what to do next year,” he said.

Aside from the gap in open hours, Arnett said Catholic Charities has excelled at running the warming shelter, as the Commission has heard little to no complaints.

“It’s much better than it was a couple of years ago, I can say that,” he said. “It’s much more organized. Catholic Charities has really stepped up and done a wonderful job with the warming shelter itself during the normal hours. I don’t think we’ve really heard any complaints about how that’s been functioning.”

For more information on services offered by Hazel’s House of Hope, visit hazelshousewv.com.