JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — As people prepare to bundle up for the arctic freeze this weekend, local social services shelters, like Sulzbacher, are stocking up.
“Whether we are at capacity in our shelter buildings in our shelter beds or whether we have openings we do something called cold night,” Kari Messer, Human Service Administrator for Sulzbacher, said. “We open up to anybody that wants to come in.”
Messer with Sulzbacher says they put on cold nights whenever the temperatures get 40 degrees or below.
Our First Alert Weather team says ‘feels like temperatures’ are going to be in the single digits this weekend and the frigid temperatures will carry on through early next week.
Even driving throughout downtown today, we saw people handing out clothes, hats, and gloves to people in need.
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“Oh my gosh I worry about them, we come down and bring them blankets when it’s really cold.” Debbie Hoover, who was volunteering her time, said.
We asked Messer what would happen if Sulzbacher reached capacity.
“Well, thankfully, we actually have not run into that. We can actually have up to 25 individuals here at the women’s and families campus and we can have up to 75 individuals at the men’s campus. However, if that was to happen, we would try to facilitate somebody to go to one or the other local shelters,” Messer said.
Action News Jax reached out to the Salvation Army and City Rescue Mission to see what their plans are for the cold. We’re still waiting to hear back.
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