Vancouver homeless shelters brimming: 1,300 seek refuge nightly

By Irwin Loy
The Tyee.ca
January 6, 2009 07:00 pm

An average of 280 homeless people a night jammed into emergency shelters opened by Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson's “action team” during the last three weeks, the mayor's office announced Tuesday.

The temporary shelter spots in a church, an old hotel and an empty city building supplemented some 750 permanent shelter spots already open in the city and another 350 or so “extreme” beds that open only during severe weather.

In the first two weeks of opening, more than 4,000 visits were recorded.

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