The grand opening of a permanent, year-round shelter in Redmond saw a full house on November 2, where locals gathered to celebrate and learn about the new Shepherd’s House shelter. The shelter will begin offering overnight stays on Nov. 15, operating from 6pm to 7am.
“This event today is a great encouragement that the community really wants to see this succeed and really wants to see us help people,” said John Lodise, the director of emergency services at Shepherd’s House Ministries.
Redmond’s Shepherd’s House has 24 single men’s beds and 12 single women’s beds in a separate room, along with three family rooms, two of which are large enough to hold a family of five. Guests at the shelter will have access to showers, laundry, hygiene products, a fully stocked clothing room and case management. The shelter won’t offer day services until next spring.
“We will be intentionally seeking to help people with whatever practical basic steps they need to take forward,” said Lodise. “I’m excited about the ability to have people be here, to see them get all of these services that I know they struggle with.”
The Redmond facility is a low-barrier, walk-in shelter which will conduct intake in the same way as The Lighthouse, Shepherd’s House Ministries’ shelter in Bend. The opening of the Redmond shelter comes nearly three months after The Lighthouse announced it would begin construction on its shelter remodel this winter, forcing it to operate with only 50 of its 100 total beds.
Discussions around bringing Shepherd’s House to Redmond have taken place for many years, according to Lodise. “Finding a facility here seemed almost next to impossible,” he said. Shepherd’s House previously offered winter shelters in Redmond in a series of host churches throughout the city. In recent years, temporary facilities saw anywhere from 20 to 40 people a night.
“For seven or eight years, it was a winter shelter that operated often out of our church gym, other churches as well, so to have a permanent year-round facility is a huge win,” said Rick Russell, the executive director of Mtn. View Community Development, who attended the grand opening.
“I remember sitting in our church foyer having meetings five, six years ago trying to come up with the funds just to keep the winter shelter open for that year, and now we’re on a whole new level here, so I think it’s really exciting.”
This article appears in Source Weekly November 2, 2023.
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While its nice to offer permanent shelter with that offer there is no requirement for background checks or moving towards sobriety. Therefore success rate to permanent housing is low. The Bethlehem Inn in Redmond as of last week on a local news broadcast stated they had 22 beds available and dont have occupants so they were thinking of transitioning those units to housing style apartments for those on the verge of losing housing. They have requirements and are high barrier. This really says something about the choices being made by houseless and that they actually dont want to make change and be held accountable. There is a great resource for them and they dont want to have skin in the game. This is exactly why housing first does not work. If we are going to help solve this crisis, people need to be held accountable. So with 22 beds available, why did we use resources for Shepards House. Its a valid question. I am a bit perplexed by this.
Until you have walked in a homeless person’s shoes, you know not of what you’re talking about. Be a part of the solution, not a part of the problem.