Allegheny County announces addition of 600 shelter beds, elimination of Code Blue alerts for winter

Hanna Webster / Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

The Allegheny County Department of Human Services has announced an expanded shelter plan for the homeless ahead of the winter months.

The plan, which includes an additional 600 beds for single adults across 12 county facilities, was unveiled at a media briefing on Monday. The county will do away with issuing periodic Code Blue alerts in the event of temperatures forecast to dip below 26 degrees, instead opting to keep shelters open overnight.

“Our goal is to ensure that no one has to spend a night out in the cold,” DHS Director Erin Dalton said. “I’m so pleased that this year we will not need a Code Blue protocol for people experiencing homelessness because shelter and daytime supports will be open every day, all winter, and not just on the coldest nights of the year.”

The Code Blue system was enacted last winter and was declared when the air temperature was forecast by the National Weather Service to fall below 26 degrees between 4 p.m. and 8 a.m., and all DHS homeless shelters would open for 24 hours. The new plan will make that protocol unnecessary. 

DHS has also partnered with nonprofits Northside Partnership Project and Community Family Advocates to open a new shelter at the Community Resource Mall on Maple Avenue on the North Side. The shelter is expected to open Dec. 11 but can be available sooner if needed.

Ms. Dalton said the expanded plan is in response to an increase in people experiencing homelessness, with officials estimating there are around 200 people who are unsheltered in the county, meaning they are living in tents or similar arrangements.

Per an Allegheny County dashboard, 1,026 people were unhoused and using the shelter system in Allegheny County, as of Jan. 30.

The additional beds and extended hours will allow more people to shelter inside during the colder months, and the plan is set to be in effect from Nov. 15 to March 15, Ms. Dalton said.

“Often, the first step for folks is getting them inside where they can stabilize,” she said.

Another part of the expanded plan is the reopening of Second Avenue Commons, which shuttered in June after a fire, leaving hundreds without shelter.

Starting next week, the shelter will be open daily from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Second Avenue Commons will also provide transportation to and from the new North Side shelter.

“This is a really big deal for folks who are on the street to have an available place to go every day,” Ms. Dalton said.

There will inevitably be people who are reluctant to visit a shelter, either due to negative past experiences, drug use or an unwillingness to leave their tent encampment, said Danielle Schnauber Jones, a nurse practitioner with Pittsburgh Mercy’s Operation Safety Net.

“It’s just like leaving your home unlocked,” she said. “People don’t want to lose their stuff, or they worry about getting sick [with withdrawal] while at a shelter.”

Robert Ashford, executive director of Unity Recovery, which offers 24/7 drop-in support for the unhoused at its South Side location, said the expanded plan and bolstered partnerships are good start before the cold weather descends on the region. 

“I am hopeful that this year’s response is off to a much better start and bodes well for us to effectively address the impacts of cold weather on the community,” he said. “It’s happening earlier, and communication is much improved.”

DHS relies partly on street medicine outreach groups, like Unity and Operation Safety Net, to reach those in encampments and to treat injuries like wounds or injuries related to xylazine, opioid overdoses or frostbite.

“We work really closely with the street medicine teams,” Ms. Dalton said. “They’re an important part of why the plan looks different this year. Our staff is well-versed, and we’ve trained folks on cold-weather injuries too.”

Ms. Jones said she and other medical staff on the county’s Homeless Advisory Board are working on a winter shelter guide for medical care needs. Operation Safety Net saw three separate instances of frostbite during a Code Blue alert last winter that lasted multiple days, and Ms. Jones said xylazine wounds have “skyrocketed” in the past six months.

“One of the big things we learned from last year is that cold-weather injuries do happen, particularly when you don’t have shelter every night,” she said. “I am definitely happy to hear that this is going to be a nightly shelter. Hopefully, if folks are there every night, cold-weather injuries will decrease, and we can connect more people to care.”

It’s also important for the public to welcome the homeless into their communities, Ms. Dalton said.

“People experiencing homelessness these days, and always, are not so different than you and I,” she said. “They are a paycheck, a health bill away, and just with rents increasing in this region in ways we haven’t seen in the past, lots of people are finding themselves in these situations, who have worked their entire lives.”

DHS and Pittsburgh Mercy are accepting donations of warm clothing at the Human Services Building, located at 1 Smithfield St., Downtown from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., Monday to Friday.