Night shelter gets nod

NICOLA BRENNAN-TUPARA

Hamilton's homeless men are a step closer to having a warm, inviting place to spend the night with resource consent being approved for a new men's shelter in the city.

This is welcome news for the Christian Nightshelter Trust's Peter Humphreys, who has had to turn men away from their current cramped 14-bed shelter in an old Chinese Restaurant on Rostrevor St.

Hamilton City Council last month approved resource consent to operate a new shelter on Anglesea St – now all the trust needs is another $300,000 and the building consent.

Mr Humphreys is hopeful the new shelter – which could house up to 30 men – will be open by Christmas.

It will be housed in the old Hauora Waikato Maori Mental Health Services building, next to Child Matters and Work and Income.

The trust initially needed $1 million for the project. When the Times spoke with Mr Humphreys back in May $300,000 had been raised. Since then the donations have been pouring in and the trust now has $700,000 – three-quarters of what is needed.

Mr Humphreys said he was humbled by the outpouring of goodwill for the shelter.

"It's fantastic. I think people realise that it's a really good cause and because we have been around so long, and had so many guests, people see that the service in necessary."

The new building would house emergency accommodation in several separate rooms, with a few beds in each.

Those who stayed on a bit longer would be able to be housed in separate rooms upstairs.

There would also be rooms kept aside for transgender people, who don't fit the criteria for either the men's or women's shelter.

"There's also going to be lots of storage space," Mr Humphreys said.

"At the moment we've got nowhere to put stuff people donate. With the new storage we'll be able to keep lots of bits of furniture and stuff like that to give people when they leave us."

People needed to know that everyone was only a "couple of degrees away" from homelessness, he said.

"All it takes is maybe mental health issues or a traumatic incident in your life and it can change everything.

"You can become homeless quite quickly."

Mr Humphreys had seen everyone from successful businessmen to people straight out of jail come through the shelter.

In the past five years, 1793 men have used the shelter, while 695 women have used the trust's female shelter in Hamilton East.

Those wanting to donate to the shelter can do so by depositing money in the following account: ASB Bank, 12-3152-0076868-00.

- © Fairfax NZ News