LOOKING FOR SHELTER

Ask Win Poor about the shelter he has run for over a decade in an abandoned lot near MIT, and he'll tell you about the three small trailers, long past repair, falling apart around the 55 alcoholics the shelter serves every night.

Poor, his colleagues and the city all say the time has come for the shelter, the only "wet" one in Cambridge, to find a new home. And the shelter, run by the Cambridge and Somerville Program for Drug Abuse and Rehabilitation (CASPAR), has already set its sights on a property in the heart of Central Square.

But neighborhood residents have organized to oppose the move. They say the economic health of the square, already the home of 31 social services, might collapse under weight of hosting the shelter.

Residents say after years of decline Central Square is just now showing signs of economic recovery. That recovery, say Square residents, will suffer from decreased property values and frightened-away residents, tenants and clients according to residents and business owners.

"My clientele is specifically afraid of alcoholics," says Bet MacArthur, a clinical social worker in the square and clerk of the Central Square Neighborhood Safety Association.

Unlike halfway houses or other kinds of shelters, clients at the proposed shelter do not have to enter a treatment program to stay the night. If the clients do not choose to enter a voluntary detoxification program, they return to the streets the next morning.

Although Poor says most clients opt to enter the CASPAR detoxication program in Somerville almost every night, residents still say the clients might end up at their doorsteps, creating threats to their families.

"[The shelter] will bring drugs, cocaine into the neighborhood. We sacrifice, they bring that into our backyard," says Dr. Won K. Pak, an acupuncturist in Central Square and a 20-year resident of the neighborhood.

Fears like these are rampant in Central Square--fears that the shelter's director believes border on intolerance.

"Some of the figures they're talking about are offensive," Poor says. "They say that 50 percent of our clients use i.v. drugs...Maybe 10 percent of our guests have experimented with drug use."

Poor says the worries are unfounded. The new 380 Green St. location, which the shelter plans to move to sometime next year, is an ideal location not only because the building is located in the area where many clients spend their days, but also because of the proximity of the Cambridge Police Department on Western Avenue, Poor says.

"It's probably not the site we would have chosen, but the location is wonderful," Poor says. "We're near the source of the guests, and that can't help but improve the program." Poor adds that it is often impossible for the shelter's guests to make it from the Square to the shelter at MIT.

MIT, which owns the current CASPAR cite and is anxious to move the shelter, has provided the new Green Street location. In return for three city street MIT has agreed to develop the Green Street cite to CASPAR's specifications and give it to the city. The city in turn will lease the building to the shelter.

City Councillor Alice K. Wolf says the council "has not made up its mind" whether Green St. is the best site for the shelter. She also said accepting the wet shelter into their neighborhood would be no "more than their fair share in a societal problem."

The tension between the shelter and the community has intensified over the past few weeks, with public community meetings breaking out into shouting matches. In addition to raising questions about the safety of the shelter, residents have also called CASPAR a well-intentioned but misguided program.

Supporters and opponents will meet next Tuesday for another time to try to come to terms over the proposed site, but it is doubtful whether that session will be able to ease the tension surrounding the proposed move.

"CASPAR looks like a good organization, but they're making the situation worse," Central Square resident Arlen Wolpert says.

Poor says that the image problem is the shelter's biggest hurdle. "The challenge for us is to get across that we're not just a flop house," he says. "We try to get people in the door. Our primary goal is to save lives.

But no matter how hard Poor argues, the residents don't appear to be easing their opposition. Residents say they simply won't stand having the shelter in their neighborhood.

"Don't bring it into my backyard," Pak says. Any other place, that's fine."