Safe Harbor is just a few steps away from getting the correct permits to stay open year-round.
Brad Gerlach is the facility manager and volunteer coordinator of Safe Harbor. It’s his sixth year working at the 74-bed overnight shelter.
Normally on April 30, he would have shown up at 5 a.m. to clean and pack everything away until the following October.
“Sad doesn't really even begin to describe it,” he said of the atmosphere on closing day in past years. “There are a lot of tears and a lot of hugs because nobody wants to go.”
He said that it was hard each year to send people out, many of whom didn’t have another place to go. Often, they would end up camping in places like the Pines — a wooded area of Traverse City near Division and 11th streets.
“We would have 70-year-olds going out to camp,” he said.
In the past, those staying at the shelter would also lose access to the support provided there when it closed for the season. For example, since October, Safe Harbor has had a full-time resource manager helping connect people to outside services like supportive housing, job training, or therapy.
“If someone's making steps ... those can continue," he said. "It used to be in the summer there was that disconnect, and often you'd see people kind of slide right back to where they were.”
Safe Harbor's spokesperson Josh Brandt said having the shelter open year-round makes it easier for staff to connect with guests.
"Sometimes folks are coming from a place where they're not going to open up right away," Brandt said. "It takes a little bit of time to build that relationship, to really understand where they're coming from and what might be best for them."
The shelter’s budget got a boost from Traverse City, Grand Traverse County, the Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians, and various community donors to help make year-round operations possible. With that money, Safe Harbor's annual budget will double to $1.1 million.
The organization does not plan to provide dinner at the shelter as they do in the winter, since other food pantries open up for the summer season. Gerlach says it's also harder to find summer volunteers.
For now, the shelter can stay open until at least May 15.
Safe Harbor is still waiting for city commissioners to vote on whether to extend their permit through the summer, following a public hearing on May 5.
Gerlach, the facility manager, says he's optimistic. After all, it was the city that asked them to stay open year-round in the first place.
