Deteriorating living conditions at a temporary shelter in Montgomery County for those experiencing homelessness have become a flashpoint between County Executive Marc Elrich and Council President Tom Hucker.

At the beginning of the pandemic, two recreation centers, the Gwendolyn Coffield Community Center in Lyttonsville and the Long Branch Community Recreation Center in Silver Spring, were temporarily converted into shelters to house about 100 people experiencing homelessness. The decision, made by County Executive Marc Elrich, was in response to concerns about COVID spreading among the homeless population in tight-knit congregate settings. But, at the Coffield Center, which provides cots for 50 to 65 women, there have been several reports in recent weeks of mice around sleeping areas, mold in the bathrooms, and leaks from the ceiling. This was confirmed through a WAMU/DCist tour of the facility and photos provided to WAMU/DCist.

Several women at the Coffield Center spoke to DCist/WAMU on background because they feared losing access to housing if they identified themselves. One woman reported that there are only three bathrooms and four showers, and they reek of urine and feces. Another reported that she woke up to a mouse crawling on her. And a third said her belongings were soaked during torrential storms just a few weeks ago.

“I feel like people need to understand this place is not designed for us to live out of,” one woman said. “The end goal for everybody here is to get an apartment. Everybody wants to be able to move out and live on their own…but I feel like they should have put more thought process into putting us into a community center.”

The ultimate goal of the county is to help people seek stable permanent housing, but Amanda Harris, the county’s chief of special needs housing, says finding stable permanent housing for these women can take three to four months without a global pandemic. Many barriers can slow down the process: difficulty finding work and reliable income, landlords not wanting to offer housing to those who are experiencing homelessness, and delays in caseworkers finding time to meet with their clients.

Harris says the bigger issue is the lack of affordable housing in the county and region, more widely.

“There never has been enough housing. There’s definitely a lack of affordable housing here particularly for the folks that we see that are experiencing homelessness that are extremely low income they’re making less than 30% of the area median income,” Harris told DCist/WAMU.

That means less than $40,000 a year in a county that has one of the highest area median incomes in the country.

The coordinators with Interfaith Works, the non-profit organization that is partnered with the county to operate the shelter and provide services, were also not expecting to be in the rec center for more than three or four months. It’s been 17 months that they’ve been operating out of the rec center.  Courtney Hall, CEO for Interfaith Works, told DCist/WAMU that while the pandemic has been a challenge for his organization, he recognizes that those experiencing homelessness have had greater challenges.

“It’s been a significant challenge for them to have to adjust and figure out where to access resources like food, clothing, shelter,” Hall said. “What I’m happiest about is that Montgomery County in particular has made it a priority to make sure that there are adequate shelter services, like this was considered from the very beginning an essential service and has been supported as such.”

But, Council President Tom Hucker, who is considering a run against Elrich for county executive, said last week if this were a private business like a restaurant or hotel, the county would shut it down due to conditions there. However, the county owns this property and is in charge of maintenance and repairs to the building.

“I think it was a terrible decision for the county executive to commandeer those two rec centers for emergency housing. It’s counter to our racial justice or social equity policies and reflects a lack of compassion and respect,” Hucker said at a press conference last week.

Elrich stood by his decision to convert the rec center at his press conference last week saying that Hucker and other council members had the opportunity to say something when this plan was created last year.

“If they had objections that were that strong it would have been really helpful if those objections had been made at the beginning when it was in front of them instead of later,” Elrich said. “This is really difficult, our policy has been in this county that you sleep outside most of the year and when it gets cold we provide shelter…and during COVID we had to make sure we brought people inside and do it quickly.”

Of the more than 16,000 COVID tests conducted in the county’s shelters since May 2020, 84 clients and 17 staff members have tested positive. There were six COVID-related deaths in the county’s entire homeless population — only two were unhoused, according to the county’s health department. That’s one of the lowest rates among homeless populations in region. In the District, 553 people in the city’s shelters contracted COVID and 25 lives were lost since the beginning of the pandemic, according to the department of human services.

To solve the issue of lack of shelter space, a new shelter is being constructed and is expected to be ready by late December or early January, according to Elrich. In the meantime, Elrich says, he’s trying to find more space in the county to temporarily house people and he hopes to announce a plan this week.

But what women at the shelter want is stable permanent housing, and until the county solves the problem of a shortage of affordable housing, shelter space will continue to be an issue. After Hucker ‘s visit to the Coffield Center earlier this month, women at the center told DCist/WAMU that Hucker said he could get them into a hotel. But some say they’re not hopeful.

“I’m used to empty promises,” one woman said.

This story was corrected to reflect the accurate spelling of the location of Coffield Community Center.