Shelter Gives Homeless More Than Warmth
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Posted: 5:47 PM Jan 10, 2010
Shelter Gives Homeless More Than Warmth
Local residents and volunteers have stepped to provide jobs and food for people housed at the severe weather shelter.
Reporter: Deneige Broom
Email Address: deneige.broom@wctv.tv
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When the severe weather shelter opened Mark Henjes took advantage.
The freezing temperatures made it dangerous for him to sleep under the overpass where he's been for almost 6 months.

Now, he has heat and an opportunity. A local business owner offered him a job.

That's been the story at the Mathis Auditorium.

People from the community have been stepping up and reaching out to those who've been left in the cold.

Everyone at the shelter received free cuts Saturday night from a local resident.

Restaurants have provided multiple meals daily for those in the shelter.

Connections at the shelter have also helped two other people land jobs.

People being housed at the shelter say everyone at the shelter treats them like family.

Mark has been unemployed for almost five months.

He just shaved the beard he's had for 23 years to prepare for his first day back to work.

He begins his trial period with a local landscaping company on Monday.

Latest Comments

Posted by: double cross Location: tally on Jan 11, 2010 at 08:13 AM

Although I think the services provded at the Shelter are vital to the community I disagree with their philosophy. NO PERSON shoudl receive services from ANY social Service agency for 20 years. The goal should ALWAYS be to get people OFF of services so that others can use them. Maybe the reason the Shelter cannot handle the crowd is because no one ever leaves.
Posted by: anonymous on Jan 10, 2010 at 10:19 PM

I am thankful that we will have had fewer people die from this cold. (Fewer will have ded not because of the taxes we have paid to have been PREPARED for this but because citizens got online and bellowed and then they got busy and "made things hapen" - it wasn't because we have paid taxes and paid individals to hae been prepared for such an emergency.) And I know some have to be politically correct and praise the help the CITY OF TALLAHASSEE has all of a sudden pulled out of their behinds. And also I'm sorry that there was no way to make a comment on the story just now on the WCTV piece on the CITY doing this. But I don't.....have to be politically correct...and I will say....City commisioners and people whose jobs it was TO BE PREPARED...I will not forget at lelction time. Nope, I'll not forget. You are a day late and a dollar short in my book. There should have been a game plan in place to start with. Freezing temps are not unheard of in Tallahassee.
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