November. We already know that it’s a new season and snow’s on the horizon. But after a prolonged Indian Summer, Colorado’s first substantial snowfall was anything but a dusting. It was more of a surprise attack, especially in the southern part of the state.
The snow which was accompanied by winds of up to 40 mph, encompassed a swath of southern Colorado that included El Paso, Pueblo and Fremont counties. Baca and Las Animas County, both east of Pueblo, were also hit hard with up to two feet of snow. La Veta Pass, connecting Walsenburg with Fort Garland on U.S. Highway 160 got nearly three feet of snow.
The town of Beulah, an off the interstate hamlet 25 miles southwest of Pueblo got more than a first snowfall baptism. The National Weather Service reported more than two feet of snow fell on the town. Other nearby towns, including Rye and Colorado City, were each covered by nearly a foot of snow.
While Colorado Governor Jared Polis was declaring a disaster emergency authorizing the National Guard to lend a hand where it was needed, the Colorado State Patrol was closing I-25 from the outskirts of Pueblo to the New Mexico state line.
In Pueblo, where the NWS measured nine inches of snow, Mayor Heather Graham declared a temporary housing and shelter emergency. The declaration, which went into effect on November 5th was extended through Friday, November 15th.
Graham’s order says “local churches, synagogues, mosques, temples and other religious institutions may utilize their buildings as temporary shelters for the city’s homeless.”
“The city recently took over the (Pueblo) rescue mission,” at 710 W. 4th Street and opened it up as a warming shelter, Graham said. The mayor’s order Iallowed the Pueblo’s Fire Department to outfit the shelter with cots and blankets recently purchased by the city for these seasonal emergencies.
Pueblo routinely enacts temporary housing and shelter emergency edicts once the temperature drops “under thirty (degrees),” Graham said. Decisions on when to open the facility, she added, are “day to day and (depending on) what the weather is going to be.” The mayor’s emergency declaration may have come just in time.
“In the last three months,” Graham said, “we have cleaned out three of the largest encampments in Pueblo.” The largest of the homeless camps, euphemistically called ‘the Jungle,’ was occupied by as many as 75 men and women.
But despite no longer having a gathering place, the newly displaced homeless have not flocked to the city’s shelters, including the Rescue Mission. “It has a capacity of about a hundred,” said Graham. It remains only half full.
In order to stay in any of the city’s shelters, Graham said you have to be age 18 or older. While families now make up one of the newest segments of the homeless population, Pueblo’s shelters have been little draw for families. But Graham said the city has made provisions for families. “If there is an unhoused family,” Graham said, “there are (other) locations to shelter them.”
