With its lease expiring at the end of June, the Jefferson County Emergency Shelter is set to close, giving the center’s 12 occupants two months to relocate.
The …
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With its lease expiring at the end of June, the Jefferson County Emergency Shelter is set to close, giving the center’s 12 occupants two months to relocate.
The good news, said Kathy Morgan, director of housing and community development for Olympic Community Action Programs (OlyCAP), is that “most have already found housing: only a couple folks that are left are working with case managers to identify housing.”
Located in the basement of the American Legion Hall on Monroe Street in Port Townsend, the shelter historically was open only during the winter – from mid-October to April 1 – but it has been operating as a year-round shelter since 2017.
“During COVID we were open 24/7 and had to move a couple times for space to socially distance,” Morgan said. “We had close to 50 during that time. Since COVID, and with the opening of our Caswell-Brown transitional, the two tiny home villages from Bayside, plus the opening of 7th Haven, we have housed most of that population. This year, the most we had during winter was 25, and in the summer now it dwindles down to around five or six.”
Morgan said the shelter provided hot meals in the winter and cold sandwiches in the summer and linked people to OlyCAP case managers to help them find and obtain additional services.
During the winter, and outside of COVID, the shelter operated from 4 p.m. to 8 a.m. In the summer, the shelter has been open from 7 p.m. to 7 a.m. Starting in May, the shelter will move to the summer schedule.
Olympic Community Action Programs, which operates the shelter, is in the process of building a permanent facility near the Caswell-Brown Village (CVB) near the Port Townsend Paper Co. mill. That open-air shelter, built in September 2022, currently has 50 guests and is almost at capacity. It has space for cars, tents and RVs, and also has 20 tiny homes and a three-sided covered washing station with on-demand hot water. Port Towsnend-based Community Build partnered with OlyCap and to build the tiny homes and wash station.
“Our new shelter should be ready to occupy by summer 2025," Morgan said. “We are securing some gap funding currently … just waiting on that and we are shovel-ready.”
