Share: 
Tuesday Editorial

New solution needed to serve Cape Region's homeless

December 29, 2015

Immanual Shelter in Rehoboth Beach provides emergency shelter to people in need during cold winter months. The organization now plans to build a year-round facility in West Rehoboth, where it will be close to public transportation and organizations that provide services people may require.

Plans for a shelter in West Rehoboth have sparked emotion on all sides. Many support a year-round shelter to serve the region’s many people in need. They say the people of the Cape Region can certainly find a way to provide shelter for people who are homeless.

What has drawn passionate opposition is the proposed location of the shelter, in West Rehoboth, near the busy West Side New Beginnings youth center.

Immanual Shelter already operates a shelter in a church building close to the Community Resource Center, which offers a food bank, a baby pantry and a way to connect with many social services; both are on Oyster House Road, and neither is far from the proposed West Rehoboth site.

These buildings are already in use, serving many of the same people who would benefit from services at the new location.

The question is, why has the shelter decided to move? When the two Oyster House Road facilities opened, only a few years ago in 2010 and 2011, their use by service agencies drew little, if any, opposition. Why not build on facilities that are already established and accepted?

In coastal Sussex, where land is expensive, why not build upward? Instead of spreading out to a new location where neighbors vehemently object, why not expand or replace one of the two existing buildings that already do an excellent job helping people find needed services?

With so many creative and successful building contractors in our area, it is hard to believe no one could come up with plans to enlarge one of the two existing buildings so they could serve the same need as the proposed 20-bed shelter in West Rehoboth.

This is the time of year to look forward to find new solutions. With imagination and good will, there must be a way to assist people in need in the Cape Region without drawing opposition from other groups who work hard – and successfully – to serve their communities.

 

Subscribe to the CapeGazette.com Daily Newsletter