The Johnson Street shelter received the Board of Health approval necessary for a September reopening to serve unhoused Missoulians, but many are wondering what the site’s future will hold.

The Missoula City Council this week opted to delay its decision on reopening the shelter. Criticisms from the community and council have accompanied Mayor Jordan Hess’ effort to reinstitute Johnson Street as a year-round shelter.

“There’s been no opportunity for the neighborhood to engage in or participate in this decision,” said Ward 4 Councilor and mayoral candidate Mike Nugent. “The bus has left the station.”

Many of Nugent’s colleagues and neighbors from Ward 6 echoed this sentiment. Councilor Kristen Jordan, who represents the ward where the shelter is housed, said she was “exceptionally frustrated” with the process to reopen the shelter.

Some of her constituents described those frustrations to council this week, citing drug use and other unsavory behaviors that have erupted in the neighborhood since the shelter went into place three years ago. But city staff explained the urgency of the houselessness crisis and the lack of alternative spaces have forced the mayor’s hand when it comes to finding a place to house vulnerable community members.

“We are in an emergency with houselessness in our community,” said Houseless Programs Manager Emily Armstrong. “This is the building the city already owns. It’s a building that we’ve operated the shelter out of previously and we know that it will work for the short-term.”

Armstrong added that a meeting on Aug. 22 and an open house at the shelter on Sept. 6 are meant to facilitate community engagement in the issue.

“This use is temporary,” Hess stressed to council. “There is a higher and better use for this site.”

Nugent asked to include a condition stipulating the building would be torn down within three years and the master planning process would start in the next year. Hess responded that he can’t put conditions on future councils.

For the time being, the shelter has Board of Health permission to operate through September 2024. But the contract to fund and operate the facility for that time period hasn’t received council approval yet. The contract asks for $789,345 from American Rescue Plan Act funds and county support, for at least one year of funding.

If council votes in favor of the contract and the shelter reopens in September, the city will still have to look at a long-term solution for sheltering Missoulians come next fall.