It is the goal of the City of Portland to undertake work on a new state-of-the-art, one-story, adult emergency shelter to replace the Oxford Street Shelter. The new shelter will be open 24-hours a day, 7-days a week with on-site meals and a wide range of services including:  health and mental health care, substance use treatment, housing assistance, peer support, case management, employment assistance, and more.

The City of Portland’s shelter guests and valued staff deserve to live and work in a respectful and safe environment. We will no longer allow some of our most vulnerable community members to live in inadequate conditions and in locations where they are easily abused, taken advantage of, and judged for their perceived shortcomings.

The current adult shelter on Oxford Street is leased, poorly configured, and requires residents to vacate the facility every morning with all of their belongings. The building has three floors which require almost double the number of staff who could oversee guests in a single-story building designed specifically as a shelter. It also has cramped sleeping space which necessitates floor mats rather than cots and utilizes a large area for sleeping in the eaves of the building.

This page contains information about the recently unveiled staff recommendation for a potential homeless services center location, the possible configuration of such a center, the services it would provide, and frequently asked questions. We will update the page as we progress through the process. Thank you for your interest and support.

The Council's Health and Human Services and Public Safety Committee is currently reviewing the staff recommendation for the location of a new homeless services center. There was a public hearing on July 10 and the Committee is expected to discuss the matter again at its September 11, 2018 meeting.