ANNISTON, Ala. (WIAT) – The city of Anniston is a little more than $200,000 away from its $1.7-million goal needed to build a new emergency shelter and transitional living facility to help fight homelessness in Calhoun County.
United Way of East Central Alabama says the building standing now on Gurnee Avenue will hopefully soon be torn down and replaced with a new building that could serve up to 80 people experiencing homelessness.
“We’ve always prided ourselves on being somewhere that you can find that help that you need,” Jackson Hodges, public relations director for the city of Anniston, said.
There hasn’t been an emergency shelter in Anniston since before the COVID-19 pandemic when the Salvation Army closed the doors to its shelter. Almost three years ago, the city formed a homelessness prevention task force in partnership with United Way of East Central Alabama and began researching and planning a transitional living facility …