PORTLAND, Maine — City officials including the mayor of Portland faced a hostile crowd of residents opposing a plan to build a new emergency homeless shelter.
The city meeting Thursday was meant to address concerns about a city plan to build a $10 million, 200-bed emergency shelter at a city-run nursing home. The Portland Press Herald reports residents attending the meeting booed and shouted at city officials, and said they were concerned about issues at the Oxford Street Shelter — which is in a converted apartment building in the Bayside neighborhood and is over capacity — coming to their neighborhood.
[Portland may build state’s largest homeless shelter miles from downtown]
Violent crime, including recent shootings, and drug abuse in Bayside have drawn concern by residents there.
“What makes you think it would be any different here?” said Lynn Campbell who lives in the Nason’s Corner neighborhood where the new facility is proposed to be located, according to the Press Herald. “How are you going to keep us safe?”
Police Chief Michael Sauschuck says the new “one-stop” shelter would be easier to police because the city owns the land.
City officials say the vast majority of people needing emergency shelter are in and out in a matter of weeks or months.
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