Richard McCauley, 58, has spent every day at the Fair Park temporary shelter over the weekend. He’s been sorting donated clothes and serving meals to his unhoused neighbors. When he’s not at his North Oak Cliff home or his technology sales job, McCauley is at the site helping those in need.

“Anybody that comes down here, they’re going to see some heart-wrenching things,” McCauley said. “You’ll see people walking barefoot and in difficult circumstances. But at the same time, they’re going to see those people get loved on very, very well.

“And that’s hope.”

More than 1,500 people sought protection from the winter weather at three shelters – Fair Park, Austin Street Center and Oak Lawn United Methodist Church – over the four days since operations started Friday afternoon, according to data from Austin Street Center.

The city of Dallas and nonprofit partners are calling on the public to join volunteers like McCauley and serve at the shelters, which are run by OurCalling, Austin Street Center and the Oak Lawn church.

The city’s temporary weather shelters will remain open through the weekend as temperatures are expected to drop below freezing again after a short warm-up on Thursday, prompting calls for more volunteers to help.

“We do think that there will be a longer haul for inclement weather shelter as we have weather moving forward in the week that looks to meet our triggers through at least Saturday,” said Christine Crossley, the city of Dallas’ director of homeless solutions. “And we were exhausting [the first wave] of volunteers so we can really use [a second wave of] people who are interested.”

The temporary warming midweek will likely send some unhoused residents outside again, said Wayne Walker, pastor and CEO of nonprofit OurCalling. But he said the dropping temperatures expected over the weekend means the ranks of tired staff and dwindling volunteers need replenishing.

After a morning shift Tuesday, McCauley, a four-year volunteer at OurCalling, drove back home and then returned Tuesday afternoon for a three-hour shift to serve dinner before collecting trash at people’s cots.

McCauley encourages anyone who can help serve a few shifts to help those in need over the next few days.

“They’re going to be blessed to be a part of this,” he said. “They’ll have their eyes opened obviously to the extent of the problem. And hopefully, it encourages them to be a part of the long-term solution like myself.”

Shelter numbers, other services

When temperatures first dropped on Friday, 431 people sought shelter at Fair Park, according to data provided by Austin Street CEO Daniel Roby, the city’s coordinator of inclement weather shelters.

On Saturday, 713 sought shelter at Fair Park. On Sunday, Fair Park housed 772 while the newly opened Austin Street site welcomed 193 people. On Monday, Fair Park housed 840 people and Austin Street sheltered 237.

Oak Lawn United Methodist Church, which opened its doors starting Sunday, helped shelter 50 people on Sunday and 60 on Monday, according to senior pastor Rev. Rachel Griffin.

“So we do sweeps every night to try to make sure that we’ve gotten everybody into safety,” Griffin said. “We offer hot meals, and right now, we’re open around the clock because of the continuous cold through the day.”

Several other nonproft organizations have stepped up to help. Family Gateway, a homeless shelter serving families with kids, helped pay for 15 families to stay in hotels during the extreme cold, said President and CEO Ellen Magnis.

“We’re seeing more families coming in who need services as compared to pre-pandemic times anyway,” Magnis said. “We just have these little peaks when there’s inclement weather. We’re not nearly as affected as those who serve individuals because not very many families are outside.”

About 25% of families are living in their cars, and extreme weather conditions can sometimes push these groups to seek shelter, Magnis said.

Brenda Snitzer, executive director of The Stewpot, an identification service for people experiencing homelessness, says the downtown location remained closed Monday and Tuesday in line with Dallas ISD’s schools closure but services would open Wednesday.

Volunteers with the Stewpot operated two vehicles – a 15-passenger van and wheelchair-lift vehicle – to transport unhoused residents to shelter sites.

“My meal service team stayed in a hotel downtown so that they could make sure that we got hot meals to clients at The Bridge [Homeless Recovery Center],” Snitzer said. “So they’ve been doing three meals a day.”

Search and rescue efforts

In addition to staffing challenges, search and rescue teams often face unhoused people’s rejection of shelter.

“Search and rescue’s biggest difficulty is trying to convince people to come in,” Walker said. “Some of it’s people that are not used to being inside. They’re afraid of crowds. Secondarily, some of them are afraid the city’s going to run them for warrants or something, which is not going to happen. We’re not allowing that.”

The lack of background checks still isn’t enough to pull some unhoused indoors.

“You got people showing up giving them piles of firewood and cases of water,” Walker said. “And so they think they’ve got a fire until the firewood burns out at one o’clock in the morning and the water’s frozen solid.”

Walker said he’s seen firsthand the often deadly consequences of people remaining outside over days of freezing temperatures.

“We’ve seen this cycle where someone gets frostbite one year, they become an amputee the second year and then they die the third year,” Walker said. “It’s really just a reality of living outside. It’s dangerous. It’s terrible. It’s nasty.”

Walker urged everyone to find ways to give back to help those experiencing homelessness not just during inclement weather events but year-round.

“I think that when we look at this as a human life, sanctity of life issue, that has got to trump the annoying factor of seeing a guy on a corner,” Walker said. “The homeless are not problems to be solved. These are people to be redeemed.

Austin Street pipes burst

Two burst pipes at Austin Street Center flooded areas of the temporary weather shelter Monday evening, although Roby, the CEO, said overnight plumbers were able to provide temporary relief.

Staff and volunteers walked unhoused clients across the street to Austin Street’s other building every five minutes while water services were interrupted, he said.

Drivers have worked up to 15-hour days over the weekend, transporting unhoused residents to the shelters, he said.

“We’re challenged to make sure we just continue to have the volunteers and the professional staffing that we need to be able to keep all shelters open,” he said.

Roby said there have been no reports of medical emergencies at the shelters. Parkland’s Homeless Outreach Medical Services program is on-site at Austin Street and Watermark Health is at the Fair Park shelter.

“The greater challenge is the chronic issues that all of our folks experience,” Roby said. “Most of our people, they’ve got not only several disabling conditions – hypertension and untreated diabetes – it’s the emotional behavioral health challenges that are really the most present.”

North Texas Behavioral Health Authority’s care coordinators are onsite at every shelter location, Roby said. The service helped transport two people to a detox facility, two people to a respite location and 10 to access refills of prescription medications.

How to help

The public is invited to visit ourcalling.org/cold or austinstreet.org/weather/ to volunteer or make a resource or financial donation. Oak Lawn United Methodist is also seeking volunteers through https://linktr.ee/olumc.

Dallas’ Office of Homeless Solutions encourages the public to call 311 to report any unhoused people outdoors during freezing temperatures to connect them with services.

OurCalling’s day facility at 1702 S. Cesar Chavez Blvd. is serving as the designated supply drop for bottled water, blankets and coats.