Initial Fears of Getting Coronavirus
Alllyson Lynch said she had been staying at the women’s shelter on Record street, when she was told everyone needed to go to the Reno Events Center instead. She remembers this past Saturday as chaotic.
“So we were getting up in the morning and then you hear everybody, okay, pack all your stuff, then you just only pack your bedding, take a small bag with you. So it was just really like up in the air, kind of crazy… So if you have a lot of stuff you're not going to get in there. You might lose some stuff,” she said of the warnings only one bag would be allowed at the entrance to the new sleeping spot, while any additional possessions needed to stay at the shelter for now.
She said mixing all the men and women, and having a long, packed line on the first night, with all the yelling and shouting of rules, and ambulances repeatedly coming by, made her afraid of contracting coronavirus.
“I was scared to death because, you know, my idea was if we put a lot of people that are on the street in one place during the time that they're out and about, they could have contracted the virus and then you load them into one, you know, area that just kinda doesn't seem that safe to me,” she said.
She was relieved people were getting checked for their temperature before entering.
“I'm assuming a fever is a sign of the virus itself, so they wouldn't allow you to go into the center without, you know, having a decent temperature. But once you get in there, it's smooth. “
Many people living on the streets we have interviewed in recent days said they weren’t too informed about coronavirus, how you catch it, what to do if you feel sick, and why cities like Reno are shutting down businesses .
“It's a dead city except for the homeless population. We're all out and about,” Allysson said of Reno’s shutdown.
A Good Experience Once Inside
Once inside the Reno Events Center, at about eight p.m., Allyson said it’s been quiet, with people quickly going to sleep, men on one side, and women on another side.
”So you're tired and you just kind of go to sleep and there’s not a lot of snoring, surprisingly not,” she said.
The day area of the shelter is now closed to those sleeping at the Events Center, meaning their scramble for finding bathrooms, showers, and water to drink has complicated.
Allyson has bounced around in her life from her native Arizona to Sacramento and now Reno. She says she recently got a day labor job but still can’t afford rent, so needs to rely on Reno’s shelter services. Being homeless has been tough for her, she says, as she’s been robbed multiple times, losing everything including her ID. She’s also had problems with authority figures at the women’s shelter and at a detox center.
City Explains Partial Move
In an interview with Our Town Reno reporter Scott King, Public Information Officer Jon Humbert said Reno decided to make the move to the Reno Events Center to ensure more spacing between those sleeping at night. The COIT company which has a city cleanup contract concerning encampments was called in to move the mattresses.
Humbert said some people were still at the shelter. “The folks who are still remaining there are doing social distancing,” he said. “Those are folks who have [had] some medical issues in the past, they have therapy animals or if they're veterans, so that they didn't have too much disruption but can still have the social distancing.” It’s not clear where families and children are staying, as Allyson said she had not seen them at the Reno Events Center.
Pets aren’t accepted either, as it’s still generally the same rules as on Record street, and the same people being sheltered, just with more distancing now. Humbert confirmed temperatures were being checked, and that no one with a fever is allowed into the Reno Events Center, while people not already staying at the shelter are also turned away.
“We've just got to weather this storm as the community and kind of do what we can with the resources that we have,” he said, adding changes could well be made to this new process. “I think one of the challenges in the community is … making sure that people know this is not an expansion of services we offer. This is for existing clients. And as much as we want to give everyone a place to stay, every single evening, it's tough. And you know, we've gotta have our duty to the existing clients that, that we've promised services to and make sure that they're taken care of. So, I think that's one of those challenges when people come to the door, don't have a place and are not in the system, that they think that they're going to get something that they've been told by friends or other people that's available that we just simply don't have the resources for right now.”