Church can house homeless women

Andrew Glazer

COSTA MESA -- The Planning Commission voted Monday to allow a local

church to shelter 13 homeless women on its premises.

Pastor Bill Gartner of the Harbor Christian Fellowship said he expects

the shelter to be running by April.

Surrender House will provide single homeless women with shelter and food

for two to six months. A caseworker will help the women, who are working

but can’t afford rent or a hotel room, to get their lives in place,

Gartner said.

“It’s not a solution, but we’ll be filling a little gap,” Gartner said

after the meeting. “It’s been a long time coming.”

Paramedics notified the city about the shelter on West Wilson Street in

December 1998, after they were called to treat a man staying there

suffering from an epileptic seizure.

The church provided beds and food for 13 homeless men until cityofficials

shut it down in April. It did not meet city codes requiring restrooms and

a kitchen to be attached to the shelter, Gartner said.

The fellowship asked the city that same month to allow the church to

reopen its facility. Gartner said the church decided to replan the

shelter by moving the beds to a larger building attached to a kitchen and

restrooms, he said.

But at a public hearing in July, people living near the church told

Planning Commissioners they were concerned that the shelter would add to

the noise caused by the church.

“They were very anxious and apprehensive, but mostly about the noise,”

Gartner said before the meeting. “And we were guilty of not taking the

responsibility.”

Gartner said the fellowship, which rented its facility to two other

congregations, has begun enforcing noise restrictions.

To address concerns from neighbors that people would show up to the

shelter all night, Gartner said the fellowship arranged a partnership

with the Orange Coast Interfaith Shelter.

The church decided to gear the shelter to serving single women after it

discovered there were no other such facilities in Costa Mesa or

neighboring cities.

The interfaith shelter, which houses people for only three to seven days,

will refer drug-free women with steady incomes to Surrender House.

Sheri Barrios, the interfaith shelter’s executive director, said the

group only will recommend women who appear to be trying to help

themselves for the transitional shelter.