Do you think having too many nooks/etc would be as dangerous if the mall-shelters had like a safe-usage area or something, so people could do their drugs under the supervision of someone who can monitor them and administer narcan if need be, and not worry about needing to not get caught doing them? Or would there be other safety issues that would be exacerbated by big layout like a mall (e.g. assaults)?
So most of the trouble in low-barrier shelters is going to come from:
a) Theft - an obvious one. Good lockers help, especially if they aren't in the same room as the sleeping areas. Large spaces are actually really good for this. If you are stuck with lockers in the sleeping room, you can kick people out of the room during the day to prevent theft, but then you're denying sleep to people who might really need it. Cameras help, but always have blind spots and are really more useful for investigating than stopping theft.
b) Issues surrounding drug use - Obviously overdoses are a big concern, but when people are under the influence they also often act in ways that piss other people off. Meth is definitely a bigger problem than opiates there in my experience. Lotta fights start with someone having too much energy and annoying other people. You also get a lot of people in recovery who can really struggle with their neighbors using.
c) Interrupted sleep - This is kind of the big one that everything feeds into. Lockers slamming at night, people moving around all night because they are too high to sleep, just the struggle of having a ton of people sleeping in the same room... When I worked night shift, most of my job was telling people to shut up or move to the common areas, and getting yelled at by people who hadn't had a good night's sleep in days due to drugs or interruptions.
Having safe usage areas in a mall environment could help with overdoses (provided there are multiple spaces so people utilizing the service can do so away from people they are beefing with), and the space lends itself to separate storage spaces and distant sleeping arrangements. I just think a more distributed system of shelters would help serve people's needs better and integrate them into the community more.
Assaults are fortunately very rare in my experience, and usually start with one of the three issues I mentioned.
Do you think having too many nooks/etc would be as dangerous if the mall-shelters had like a safe-usage area or something, so people could do their drugs under the supervision of someone who can monitor them and administer narcan if need be, and not worry about needing to not get caught doing them? Or would there be other safety issues that would be exacerbated by big layout like a mall (e.g. assaults)?
So most of the trouble in low-barrier shelters is going to come from:
a) Theft - an obvious one. Good lockers help, especially if they aren't in the same room as the sleeping areas. Large spaces are actually really good for this. If you are stuck with lockers in the sleeping room, you can kick people out of the room during the day to prevent theft, but then you're denying sleep to people who might really need it. Cameras help, but always have blind spots and are really more useful for investigating than stopping theft.
b) Issues surrounding drug use - Obviously overdoses are a big concern, but when people are under the influence they also often act in ways that piss other people off. Meth is definitely a bigger problem than opiates there in my experience. Lotta fights start with someone having too much energy and annoying other people. You also get a lot of people in recovery who can really struggle with their neighbors using.
c) Interrupted sleep - This is kind of the big one that everything feeds into. Lockers slamming at night, people moving around all night because they are too high to sleep, just the struggle of having a ton of people sleeping in the same room... When I worked night shift, most of my job was telling people to shut up or move to the common areas, and getting yelled at by people who hadn't had a good night's sleep in days due to drugs or interruptions.
Having safe usage areas in a mall environment could help with overdoses (provided there are multiple spaces so people utilizing the service can do so away from people they are beefing with), and the space lends itself to separate storage spaces and distant sleeping arrangements. I just think a more distributed system of shelters would help serve people's needs better and integrate them into the community more.
Assaults are fortunately very rare in my experience, and usually start with one of the three issues I mentioned.
That makes a ton of sense and is really interesting to consider — thanks for sharing your thoughts and experience!