Heat hits folks hard on the streets

Bottled water donations can be dropped off at any Share of Vancouver location:

o Share House, 1115 W. 13th St.; 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. every day.

o Share Homestead, 4921 N.E. Hazel Dell Ave.; 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. every day.

o Share Orchards Inn, 5609 N.E. 102nd Ave.; 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. every day.

o Share Fromhold Service Center, 2306 N.E. Andresen Road; 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday to Friday.

Cooling centers open today

o Firstenburg Community Center, 700 N.E. 136th Ave., Vancouver, noon to 6 p.m.

o Washougal Community Center, 1701 C St., 2 to 6 p.m.

o Battle Ground Community Center, 912 E. Main Street., 8 a.m. to 8 p.m.

At Share House’s daily lunchtime on Friday, volunteers passed out bottled water for clients to take with them as they reentered the day’s heat.

It’s an effort to ease the discomfort of being stuck outdoors on hot days without the ability to simply turn on the kitchen tap to keep hydrated. And, Share of Vancouver hopes, getting enough water will prevent the city’s homeless from ending up in the hospital for heat stroke.

Some people stuffed the bottles in backpacks or filled up empty bottles in the bathroom before leaving the downtown Vancouver shelter. Those living on the streets will inevitably experience the difficult weather this weekend and throughout summer.

As lunch ended, outreach case manager Willie Hurst loaded up his van with cases of bottled water to give out in parks and homeless campgrounds around the city. “When there’s warm weather, we’ll do this,” Hurst said.

A water mister was also set up in the shelter’s parking lot to help clients keep cool. The main goal is to keep people from needing to go to the hospital for heat-related health problems, said Jessica Lightheart, Share’s community relations director. The agency is particularly worried about its elderly clients, who are more at risk of being dehydrated.

The agency recently reached out to its supporters, asking for cases of bottled water. When PeaceHealth Southwest Medical Center heard about the need, it donated two pallets (about 2,600 bottles) of water, the largest donation so far. The goal is to prevent those most at risk from needing treatment for heat-related illness.

“We need to be proactive in keeping people healthy, and this fits right in with that,” said hospital spokesman Randy Querin.

Still, hospital staff are aware of the possible influx of patients.

“It’s hard because the hydration is one thing, but finding a place out of the sun is another,” Lightheart said.

Besides shady spots and waterways, there aren’t many public places to go to keep cool in downtown Vancouver, where most of the city’s homeless reside and use services.

The air-conditioned lobby and game room at the Marshall Community Center, at 1009 E. McLoughlin Blvd. just across Interstate 5 from downtown, are free to the public. The center, a designated cooling center for the heat wave, was open until 7 p.m. Saturday but is closed today.

The downtown library, at C Street and East Evergreen Boulevard, is another public, air-conditioned facility; it’s open until 6 p.m. today.

“I try to almost slink from shady spot to shady spot,” said Ken Hockens, who’s been a Share client for about three months.

He said he’s not familiar with the local waterways, so he probably won’t be going swimming this weekend in an effort to keep cool. But he did take a couple of water bottles as he left after lunch at Share House. Normally, he stays pretty active during the day, but he doesn’t want the heat to wear him out.

“During the heat, I slow down a tad,” Hockens said.

When there’s any kind of extreme weather, it can be particularly difficult to be without stable housing, Lightheart said. Share has an established Winter Hospitality Overflow program that provides emergency shelter at local churches during cold weather. The WHO program is for overnight stays, not for daytime relief from the elements, and in the summertime that’s when relief is needed most, Lightheart said.

“There’s never really been a similar effort for the heat,” she said.

That may be because heat waves in the northwest typically come in short spurts. So this week’s predicted prolonged heat wave is especially concerning for Share.