Housing construction for homeless men in limbo after Glynn County Commission defers vote

Caption

A man experiencing homelessness in Brunswick uses The Well as a place to safely rest and escape the heat in summer 2023.

Credit: Justin Taylor/The Current

Jabari Gibbs, The Current

The rift between Glynn County residents who see the people as threats to neighborhood safety and those working to improve outcomes for the homeless is festering this summer. Last month, County Commissioners tabled a vote on whether to permit a faith-based organization to build a night shelter for local men with jobs but nowhere to live and left advocates with no clear path forward.

Saved By Grace is seeking a special-use permit to aid a specific group of homeless individuals: men who have verifiable income, jobs where they work 40 hours a week and must pass a background check. The organization, run by Donna Howard and Marie Gamble, describes its programming as a six-month transitional work program that helps men get back on their feet. 

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Donna Howard (left) and Maria Gamble (right).

Credit: Provided by Howard, Gamble

“We realized the need for men is far greater than those that are on the street as a woman. So we also realize that the man is basically the head of household,” said Donna Howard, Co-founder and Executive Director of Saved by Grace. “He is the father to children that need to have their daddies and all those things that God says he is, and there’s a lot of things that are out there for women. But there’s not all those things for the man that’s homeless.”

Howard and Gamble got permission for the permit from the Mainland Planning Commission (MPC), in early June, which decided to allow a change in zoning for the proposed property on a four-acre lot at 5140 Blythe Island Highway. But, faced with public skepticism and fear, the county commissioners declined to vote on the decision on June 18.

What is Saved By Grace? 

Howard and Gamble worked full-time jobs when they started Saved By Grace in 2016. Howard worked as a preschool teacher and Gamble in Jekyll Island’s hospitality industry for over 30 years. When they met at church, they decided to take on the full-time spiritual mission of helping people in need. Hence the name of their organization.

“We found ourselves at the same church, same congregation, of course, didn’t know it at the time, but our kids had grown up together … We never knew each other, a conversation between the two of us, we realized that we both kind of had the same passion for helping other people that are less fortunate,” said Howard. “Not necessarily the homeless person at that time. At that time, it was just like the single mom at the trailer park across the street, helping her with meals and kind of getting some of the stress off of her about preparing a meal or bringing her things for a meal kind of thing, so that’s kind of where it started.”

They professionalized their mission and received 501(c)(3) nonprofit status. 

“It just became addicting. And you know, for me, having been in the hotel business for 30 years and not ever really having done anything else, I just kind of always felt like there was a gap like there was something missing,” said Gamble. 

The organization’s beginning stages consisted of helping people living in motels across the city get the basic necessities. They also delivered beds to families with children sleeping on floors and partnered with local businesses to deliver food. In 2018, they turned their focus to Glynn’s unsheltered population. 

“It was really sad when we did go out after our full-time job, our comfort, our personal comfort, to go out there and see those people on the sidewalk sleeping or on the sidewalk sitting on the park bench trying to take a nap or whatever it may be,” said Howard. “Knowing that after we left those people, we were able to get home, get in our comfortable car with heat or AC wherever the season may be, get in a comfortable bed with heat or AC whatever the season may be, and know that we left those people on the street. That’s why we knew that there’s something to be done. Because we saw it every single day.”

In 2019, the duo secured enough funding for Howard to leave her full-time job and work as executive director in early 2019. Gamble did the same during Covid.

Early concerns 

As the homeless population in Glynn – and the backlash against the homeless population — has grown more acute, the women have sought solutions that can help keep able-bodied people find work and shelter.

That quest brought them to the MPC board in early June.

The body of seven citizens, appointed by the Board of Commissioners for four-year terms is in charge of making decisions and offering recommendations concerning the county’s growth and development.

The current planning codes do not allow overnight accommodations, and the property previously operated as a church where Saved by Grace wants to operate its shelter. 

Minutes from the MPC meeting revealed the concerns raised, including the “distance from the facility to bus stops, increased crime rates, homelessness in the community, walk-ups accessing the property, the facility’s location, traffic congestion, vacant homeless shelters in the community, privacy fence, encampments behind the property, increased foot traffic, the neighborhood aesthetic, lack of streetlights and property value.” 

Why is there still an issue?

At the MPC meeting on June 4, 2024, Sherrye Gibbs made a motion to recommend approval of the special use permit with the condition there would be no day services offered. It passed with a 4-2-1 vote. Bill Edgy and Neal Boatright voted against the motion and Kevin Higgins was recused — he serves as the architect on the project.

The pushback shocked Howard, but the two women agreed to compromise their plans in order for the project to move forward.

“At the MPC meeting, all the people that stood in opposition, they were all about being afraid of the people that walk up to receive services, the man or the woman that walks up to get an ID, the man or woman that walks up to get a shower or whatever the day service is going to be,” said Howard. “They were all about the day services not being in that building because they were fearful. So at the end of the meeting, we came to the conclusion okay, we won’t do the services here. We’ll just do the overnight program.” 

The Salvation Army is the only organization officially offering overnight services in Glynn County.  

The women hoped that a vote by the county commissioners on June 18 would be a formality.

They were mistaken.

That evening, Bo Clark, Commissioner, At Large Post 1, was the first to voice his concerns about approving the MPC decision. 

He asked Howard and Gamble if they owned the property for which they were seeking the permit. He also wanted to know if the state had inspected the property. They responded no, and told him that inspections were not required. 

Discussion then moved to safety concerns — and controversy over how many times neighbors had contacted 911 or the police about occurrences at Saved by Grace’s previous location. 

Suspicion and fear among Brunswick business owners and shoppers led to controversy about the day shelter in town known as The Well, which city commissioners have tried to close down. The organization is in litigation with Brunswick to protect its right to serve people without homes. 

What does the data say? 

Opposition against Saved by Grace at the county commissioner’s meeting stemmed from safety concerns that came from perceptions that the homeless population is unsafe. 

The Current found that between April 22, 2020 and March 2024, police were called to the previous location — 186 Cornerstone Drive — 49 times. 

That is an average of less than one call (0.24) per week over the nearly four-year period, before the organization moved from that location.

The most prevalent category of the calls was “citizen assist” and “problem person” at 10 calls each. “Citizen assist” generally refers to a non-emergency service requested by and provided to a citizen. A problem person is someone who disturbs the peace of a location.

Other reasons for calling included six follow-up calls, five calls about a suspicious person, two calls about accidental deaths, one call about an assault and a call about child abuse. 

Clark, the commissioner, didn’t appear to have accurate police data at the June 18 meeting. While he praised Saved by Grace for their work, he said he was not in favor of the change of permit because of the widespread perception of safety concerns.

“What y’all do is fantastic, but myself and the board here, we got to take into consideration the citizens. Whether y’all had 54 calls, 43 calls, or 105 calls for service from the police department, we’re strapped as a police department here, like most folks, and probably some medical was called,” said Clark at the meeting.“That’s concerning to me and to the folks that I’m hearing from, and it’s kind of concerning that no state inspections are required.”

Clark also pointed out limitations that the proposed Blythe Island address would pose. 

“The only way I’ll support anything like this is if it does not impact neighborhoods, and that’s, that’s the biggest concern I have,” said Clark. 

District 5 Commissioner Allen Booker spoke out in favor of the MPC zoning change. He said a shelter run by Saved by Grace would be safer for their clients and the community, then leaving men living on the streets. 

“For me, having these men in a structured environment versus underneath the overpass or in some of those camps makes us safer, because when they’re under the overpass in those camps, it doesn’t stop them from coming into any neighborhood,” said Booker. 

What’s next? 

The Board of Commissioners has not specified a date for voting on the special use permit. Subsequently, the site’s construction has been put on hold.

Construction is estimated to take at least six to nine months. Saved by Grace has secured over $2 million in funding from private donors.

“We have individual foundations that are paying – one is paying for the acquisition of the building, one is paying for the construction of the renovation, done deal, it will be debt free,” said Howard. 

Saved by Grace has committed to constructing a privacy fence around the perimeter of the proposed site. The back will include an eight-foot-tall fence in the back surrounded by six-foot-tall fences. The entrance will have a motorized gate with a keypad entry and call box. 

“We have all these people that want to see the issue resolved. But they don’t want to help the problem get solved. We have a proven track record. And it’s proven. You can look at our Facebook page, you can look at our website, you can ask anybody in Glynn County for the most part,” said Howard. “We have a proven track record with accountability-based recovery, all those things. We are 100%, zero tolerance, all those things. But they don’t want to approve for us to be rezoned.”

This story comes to GPB through a reporting partnership with The Current.