Anchorage to open warming area on Fourth Avenue

The Anchorage Assembly on Thursday approved a proposal from Mayor Suzanne LaFrance to open a 50-person emergency warming area on the eastern side of downtown for people who need to get out of the cold.

The warming area will be located at the Henning House property, formerly the Henry House, at 545 E. Fourth Ave., and will open in the coming days, city officials said. It will be open only during the coldest weeks of winter, according to a memorandum.

“It’s winter and it’s cold and people need somewhere to go,” LaFrance said during Thursday’s special meeting. “We can’t afford to pause. Any delay today means three to four more weeks of people outside and in, potentially, below-freezing temperatures.”

Social services nonprofit Henning Inc. is operating one of the city’s emergency winter homeless shelters at the same location on Fourth Avenue.

In a 10-1 vote Thursday, Assembly members approved the $202,000 contract with the nonprofit to staff and operate the warming area.

The administration’s plan was met with criticism from the agency leading Anchorage’s homelessness prevention and response system, the Anchorage Coalition to End Homelessness.

In an email to the Assembly and LaFrance officials that was sent ahead of the vote, the coalition called the proposal “short-sighted,” saying it “lacks clarity” and “doesn’t address the broader needs of Anchorage’s vulnerable residents.”

“Warming isn’t just a homelessness issue — it’s critical for those on fixed incomes, with unreliable heating, or struggling to pay utility bills,” wrote Jessica Parks, the coalition’s chief operating officer.

The city should take a more “holistic approach” and use existing city resources, such as its own buildings and its Office of Emergency Management, to provide warming for residents who are experiencing housing insecurity or homelessness, Parks said.

LaFrance, in a brief interview after the meeting, said the administration learned of the coalition’s concerns early Thursday and hadn’t yet had a chance to “dig in and talk with them.”

“But certainly we are working to have a long-term plan. We don’t want to be spending all our money on shelter and warming. We want to get people help and into stable housing, and that’s definitely our long-term goal. We have to take these life safety measures in the meantime,” LaFrance said.

Many dozens of people are people are living unsheltered around the city, sleeping in places not meant for human habitation, on the streets and in tents, makeshift shelters and vehicles. One large encampment sprawls in and around Davis Park in Mountain View.

The city’s four emergency homeless shelters, with a total of 532 beds, have been full nightly, officials said, leaving little room for walk-ins or for drop-offs by emergency responders.

Officers need somewhere safe to take people who haven’t committed a crime, don’t need a hospital and have nowhere to go, police Lt. Brian Fuchs said.

“I’ve seen officers with a person in the back of their patrol car up to five to six hours, just trying to figure out what to do with this person,” he said.

The city’s warming area plans in recent years have varied and been minimal. While using Sullivan Arena as a mass shelter during the pandemic, the city stood up small warming areas outside using tents with heaters. Last year, the municipality opened warming areas last-minute during a cold snap for just a few weeks. This year, the administration used a competitive bidding process to find warming area operators.

The administration had aimed to open enough warming space for up to 70 people, but another organization rescinded its offer of space for 20 people at the last minute, LaFrance officials said.

Officials will decide whether to open the warming area on a weekly basis based on the temperature forecast, according to a memorandum. If the average temperature for the week will be 20 degrees or lower, the warming centers will be open for the following seven days.

During those weeks, the warming area will be open from 8 p.m. to 8 a.m., said LaFrance’s special assistant in homelessness and health, Farina Brown. The center is required to provide people with a hot beverage and a blanket, and it will have at least four staff members on site.

It’s meant to be the “lowest-barrier service available” and is a life safety measure, Brown told Assembly members.

“No one is required to participate in anything other than being safe and being warm,” Brown said.

Assembly member Daniel Volland was the sole no vote, and he voiced frustration over the plans and location of the warming area, in between downtown and the Fairview neighborhood, where many homeless services are already located.

“It is nearing the end of December, and we’re scrambling to figure out emergency situations, and given a warning by the mayor, you know, this will set us back for another three or four weeks if we don’t do something and act now,” Volland said.

“Personally, I expect better of this administration,” he added.

Assembly Vice Chair Meg Zaletel, who is the executive director of the Anchorage Coalition to End Homelessness, recused herself from the vote.

The city’s emergency shelters include a 200-bed mass shelter in a former Solid Waste Services administrative building on East 56th Avenue plus the city’s three non-congregate shelter locations — where people have separate rooms — at the Alex Hotel in Spenard, the Merrill Field Inn in Mountain View and the Henning House.