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A meeting was held at Saratoga Central Catholic School on Thursday, Feb. 17, to discuss the ongoing possibility of a low-barrier homeless shelter at 5 Williams St., located behind Saratoga Catholic and bordering the school property. 

Saratoga Mayor Ron Kim and Public Safety Commissioner James Montagnino met with parents of Saratoga Central Catholic to discuss concerns and questions over the shelter. The meeting was led by Albany Diocese Superintendent of Schools, Giovanni Virgiglio, and was also attended by Christopher Signor, Saratoga Catholic Central principal, and Christopher Bott, Associate Superintendent of Schools. 

“This is a proposal that has created great unease within our school community — and for good reason,” Virgiglio said. “As a Catholic community, we are committed to the need to address homelessness within our own neighborhoods with care, passion and concern. At the same time, as a Catholic institution of learning whose mission is to educate the next generation in a safe and welcoming atmosphere, we need to ensure our students’ safety cannot come at the risk of trying to resolve another serious concern.”

John Filordimondr, who has two children at Saratoga Catholic, came to the meeting with hopes of finding a resolution that everybody can support.

“We’re concerned about the vulnerable population of Saratoga, but also concerned about the safety of our children, who are also a vulnerable population as well,” Filordimondr said. “We hope to find a spot that both communities benefit from.”

Mayor Kim reiterated his desire to work with parents and ease concerns about student safety surrounding the new shelter, while at the same time, said that the possibility of a shelter opening at the Williams Street location was still on the table.

This month, the mayor announced a task force that was being created to find a suitable location for a 24-hour, year-round shelter. Each member of the Saratoga City Council is set to nominate a member for the task force. So far 10 members have been chosen. 

“This (task force) is going to look and see if there are other places available,” Kim said. Despite the hunt for a new location, the mayor is “hopeful, but I’m not confident” that another location better prepared to take on Saratoga’s homeless would be available.

“Williams Street is not off the table completely,” he said. “We need to find a suitable replacement and that’s going to be difficult, because we’ve tried.”

During the meeting, parents were able to address the mayor directly with questions, with one parent noting that a shelter being so close to any school grounds should trump all other benefits of the Williams Street location. Others expressed concern for the homeless population but didn’t want to ignore the factor of unknown risk for their own children.

Last October, Kim announced plans to move the Saratoga Senior Center, currently housed in the Williams Street building, to the newly expanded Saratoga Springs YMCA on West Avenue and make the Williams Street location a year-round homeless shelter and navigation center.

The new shelter would be utilized by the increasing number of homeless individuals Saratoga has seen in the past year. The Woodlawn parking garage has become a place of congregation for the unhoused in recent months and subsequently a safety concern for the public due to its uncontrollable environment.

While Saratoga Catholic and the city agree that a shelter would bring stability to the homeless problem, the lack of agreement over where the shelter should be placed continues to raise concerns.

“My hope is this process gets us to a place that addresses the (homeless) problem we have and also has wide community acceptance because I think that’s the most important thing we want to do,” Kim said. “We don’t want the community being torn apart, and I think we recognize this is something we have a responsibility to do, and we should do it but do it in a way that’s best for everyone.”

“I think, to that point, you have found a community here that completely understands the challenges that are before us,” Virgiglio replied. “It has been difficult for us to reconcile this, recognizing that we do ultimately want to care for the most vulnerable among us without forsaking that the most vulnerable among us are our children too.”

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