Second Avenue Commons shelter opens Downtown after delays

PITTSBURGH (KDKA) - The Second Avenue Commons shelter is now open and taking in people experiencing homelessness with the hopes of finding many of them permanent housing. 

After more than two months of delays, the Second Avenue Commons is finally opening its doors and accepting guests. The city and the county are hopeful this could be the beginning of the end of the homeless crisis.

With snow in the air and temperatures dropping quickly, the first guests have begun checking into the Second Avenue Commons after months of living in tent encampments across the city. 

Paige Tuckfelt is happy to be in from the cold.

"I have my own room, a bed, a microwave, and it is very nice," Tuckfelt said. "And everybody who comes in will have their own room and their own keys."

One man, when asked if he wanted to go to the shelter, said, "Either that or I'm gonna end up dead. We're gonna freeze out here."

The commons is the lynchpin of the city and county's plan to address the homelessness crisis. Outreach workers from the county are trying to convince the people living in the encampment to abandon their tents and move into the shelter. Once that happens, the city intends to take the tents down. One man said he's ready to go but says the process has been slow. 

"They came by yesterday and took two people out. Two out of 40. Come on now, there's got to be some kind of solution."

After six months in a tent, Tanya Heminger now has a room of her own at the commons.

"So much better. It was so cold. We're indoors now," she said. 

She hopes to find an apartment in the coming months.

"Hopefully during that time, we'll be able to get into permanent housing and our own place outside of here," she said. 

In the coming weeks, the city is hopeful that most of the homeless will leave the tents and come to Second Avenue Commons or other shelters, and that they will be able to decommission or take the encampments down.