Charlottesville Tomorrow, Dec 9 2020: Every year, a roaming homeless shelter opens for the winter months in the Charlottesville area.
The local group PACEM sets up temporary lodgings for a week or two at a time in various churches around the city and Albemarle County. In normal years, the shelter hosts dozens of people every night between November and March.
This is not a normal year.
“The pandemic has really affected our capacity,” said Jayson Whitehead, the executive director of PACEM.
In order to achieve sufficient distance between guests, the group has reduced its capacity from 45 to about 25 in its men’s shelter and 25 to about 10 for its women’s.