Homeless shelters prep for cold weather

As temperatures plummeted nearly 30 degrees overnight and winter temperatures are expected to stick around, homeless shelters across mid-Missouri are starting to fill up.

Some were already full Tuesday night, including the Harbor House in Columbia.

“If the temperature is 45 degrees at four o’ clock in the in the afternoon, that is when we put the cold cot program in place,” said Major Richard Trimmel with the Salvation Army.

The cold cot program brings extra cots into the shelters for people when beds are already full.

The Columbia Harbor House has 63 beds and the Jefferson City Center of Hope has 48 beds.

Trimmel said they can usually move in between 10 and 20 cots in the winter.

But with the population growing, especially in Columbia, Trimmel said that also means the homeless population increases.

“With the city growing, and I think the prognosis is it’s going to be a tough winter, so we want to be ready,” he said.

Another challenge facing the Salvation Army is money.

“What has hurt us has been the changing landscape in relation to federal, state and local funding because priorities have changed in some of those areas and we have lost, not only us, but many other shelters, most of the shelters across the state of Missouri, have lost a lot of funding,” Trimmel said.

He said he is thankful for all the donations people have already made and are continuing to make.

“In the presentations I’ve been doing, I’ve been kind of letting people know that really the donations, the private donations, are really needed this year,” Trimmel said.