A Hove church is seeking to put security gates in to stop rough sleepers abusing staff and volunteers.
All Saints Church wants to put the gates across the driveway to its vicarage next door to the church in Eaton Road, which also gives access to the church hall and porch.
In a planning application to Brighton and Hove City Council, it says the porch has become used by rough sleepers.
It says: If there is no evening activity in the church and hall this does not of itself create problems.
“But increasingly considerable amounts of rubbish are created by the rough sleepers bringing in large amounts of cardboard and other detritus, including food packaging and bottles, often broken.
“Many of them also have a habit of urinating on the porch or the steps or nearby, which is both unsanitary and unsightly, and requires staff to clean the area before they can start work.
“But the worst aspect, which has been increasing for the last two years, is the accumulation of dangerous illegal drug use items, such as discarded drug hypodermic syringes.
“Keeping the area clean of all the rubbish is a necessary task for church staff, but the drug related detritus creates a specific and entirely unacceptable risk to staff, over and above the risks entailed in general rubbish clearing.
“Over the last 12 months there has been a noticeable increase in aggressive behaviour by some of the rough sleepers.
“On four separate occasions over the last few months both male and female members of staff have been threatened in an entirely unacceptable way with very aggressive and directly threatening behaviour when trying to get the rough sleepers to move on at the start of the working day or before church services and activities in the hall.
“These activities in the hall involve a very large number of elderly people and children, providing a risk to vulnerable people that cannot be allowed to continue, let alone the risk to church staff members.
“And the hall is hired out in the evening Monday to Thursday inclusive, with two of the sessions ending at 9pm, when rough sleepers have been installing themselves.
“We have discussed these issues with our dedicated police support officer who has promised quick reaction when threatening behaviour occurs, but that is unlikely to be sufficiently timely to prevent that behaviour, and not at all likely to put off night time drug users with necessarily infrequent patrols.”
The gates would be 3.3m wide and 2.4m high and locked outside normal working hours.
If the council approves the plans, the church will then have to seek permission from the diocese and the parochial church council, and then fundraise the money to pay for them.
How very Christian of them. What a load of cobblers. If you ever needed a reason to not believe in the trash they preach it’s stopping those seeking shelter. What would Jesus do ffs.
Why don’t you volunteer to collect needles and trash
Spot the numpty who just read the title before commenting. All the concerns laid out in the article article are perfectly valid.
I think this is a dilemma not only for this church.
As a former rough sleeper the homeless community has changed in recent years, and not changed for the better. It’s far more dangerous and violent. Yes. Drug addiction and alcohol principally fuel the violence to a large degree but cutbacks in services across the city are also an important factor as well.
It doesn’t help when out of control drugs dealers get a daycenter closed (Such as St Annes in Kemptown) the violence was the icing on the cake so to speak and other factors contributed as well I.e. trustees realising the financial potential of the venue compared to the peppercorn rent that was charged to the daycenter (That could be possibly deemed as somewhat un-Christian?) Also, I used to witness the exodus of clients first thing in the morning there, off the score their class A drugs and the attendant crime waves that occurred on a daily basis in St James Street (No wonder shopkeepers/business’s got a petition going?)
The closure of St Annes also deprived the homeless community of a good night shelter venue (Churches night shelter, before Covid) All Saints Church also was part of that shelter setup as well, pre Covid.
I was also deeply indebted to Tim who used to run the night shelter and the wonderful food that they used to prepare for us folks. If some rough sleepers were not part of the Churches night shelter and were sleeping in the vicarage doorway and round the front entrance. Tim also used to make sure they were fed as well (He had no obligation to do that, but did it out of the goodness of his heart) I can’t fault All Saints Church for that.
I was what I would call “Old School” homeless. Not a class A drugs user or a street drinker. The whole metric has changed now. You have a much younger population on the whole. The sense of “Entitlement” when they are off their heads is frightening even to someone like me who has spent the best part of ten years homeless (Some by choice because of the level of violence and bizarre behaviour that I’ve witnessed in hostels and supported accomodation)
Although not a Christian. My sympathies are with All Saints Church, especially after the viscious and unprovoked attack on staff like Phillip and Becky at St Mary’s in Kemptown by a massively entitled homeless crack cocaine user when they were going out of their way to try and help this idiot.