By the time (a little before 8pm Wednesday) that I got to the Hope Community Center for its last night as an evening homeless shelter, the place was packed. In the grass courtyard, round fold-up tables were surrounded by people both sitting and standing. An NBC29 news camera filmed while shelter director Josh Bare addressed the crowd of onlookers (many seemed to be Covenant churchgoers where Harold Bare is pastor), recounting the travails of the shelter over the last five months, as well as its successes. The homeless were also sprinkled about, waiting to eat the hotdogs and hamburgers spread out banquet style.
After Josh wrapped up, I stood in back when a man in a mesh baseball cap came up. He walked with a wooden cane and had eyes so deep set they were hard to see. Once we established that I wrote for a newspaper he started to explain that he was from out of town, Manassas. He was here in Charlottesville to get hip surgery and had only been staying at Hope since the previous night. "I personally want to thank them," he said. "Me being an outsider I thought that might be important. Just to show my support."