We now know when the state's homeless shelter in Gentilly will close, but what comes next for the people who are still living in the Paris Road facility? State officials say the goal is to get the remaining residents into permanent housing.
According to the head of the Louisiana Governor's Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness, the transitional housing facility on France Road will be open for no more than another three weeks.
"By April 1, we anticipate the shelter will be completely closed," Colonel Jacques Thibodeaux told WWL's Tommy Tucker. "We're going to extend the contract one week at a time."
Thibodeaux says the state will divert funds for wraparound services at the shelter to case management in hopes of housing the 78 people remaining in the shelter.
"We're going to divert the money from the wraparound services to case management to try to place these people in a proper home and give them a more permanent aspect."
Thibodeaux adds that state officials will continue to work with New Orleans leaders to get the homeless off the streets. However, Thibodeaux did not say if the state would conduct additional sweeps to clear new homeless encampments popping up under the Pontchartrain Expressway.
"The state's in it for the long haul with New Orleans," Thibodeaux said. "We'll partner with them, and we hope that this can start some dialogue across the entire process."
Thibodeaux called the program a success, saying it could be used by other cities and states battling their own homelessness crises.
"We're hoping that this becomes a model on the nationwide aspect," Thibodeaux said. "We had an opportunity to prompt a dialogue that was more long term on how to use federal money in a state application and show that you can do a transition center and show that you can transition people off of the streets into more permanent housing. A lot of the money is restricted to be spent a certain way."
