Sub Zero Mission is aiming to do its part this year to fulfill its mission that “nobody should freeze to death in America.” The Painesville Township-based nonprofit announced that it has been designated as a Lake County’s Code Blue Warming Center for this winter. Sub Zero founder and CEO Al Ra ddatz described Cold Blue conditions as “extremely low, bitter cold.” There are typically 5 to 15 Code Blue days in a given winter. “When it gets really cold, you have to have a place for them to go because it’s a suicide mission for them,” Raddatz said. “Cold kills.” He cited the example of a man who was recently found dead from hypothermia in Toledo. According to local news outlet WTOL, officials thought that the man was homeless. Raddatz noted that Lake County has one homeless shelter, which is Project Hope for the Homeless in Painesville Township. “They do a fine job and they’re fine people that run that and it’s really well run, but it’s not big enough and there are a number of reasons why people don’t go into shelters,” Raddatz said. While Project Hope shelters residents for a longer period of time, a Code Blue shelter houses homeless people overnight on Code Blue nights, he added. “We can’t deny that it’s an emergency, and so a place has to be provided,” he said. Raddatz said that Sub Zero is equipped with heated flooring, a unisex bathroom and a laundry room. It is can accommodate 30 residents, but he said that in a pinch he might be able to fit 40. “I think last year they said the high number was around 20,” he said. “Our expectation is between 15 and 30 people.” Raddatz estimated that there are around 150 homeless people within a five-mile radius of Sub Zero’s center at 1760 North Ridge Road. He added that 98 people recently ate dinner at nearby St. James Episcopal Church in Painesville, and that around 70 of those people had been living on the streets. Raddatz said that those the warming center would operate when a Code Blue is called. The people served would mostly come from Lake County. “Once it’s called, we make 211, Lifeline aware that it has been called, and then everybody is designated to call 211, and they have the latest information,” he said. Anyone who stays at Sub Zero Mission would be subject to a wand search and would be required to surrender any weapons, Raddatz said. The county Sheriff’s Office would be on notice and volunteers would chaperone the site. The center would also provide all guests with a cot, chair and stand, he said. It also offers laundry, kitchen and bathroom areas. “Things like the laundry you want to offer them so at least a person that’s in here, while they’re in there, can get their clothes clean and they can have a little dignity, and it might allow them the next day to be in some place where maybe somebody wouldn’t let them in a restaurant or something, maybe they can sit in there a little longer, sip in a cup of coffee,” Raddatz said. Raddatz believes that cold temperatures are not viewed as an emergency the same way that fires are. “If a homeless person walked into my parking lot and set themselves on fire, everybody would recognize it as an emergency and EMS and fire trucks and everybody would come over and he would be taken to the hospital and treated,” he said. “However, nobody recognizes the cold as an equal emergency, so I have to find the person dead or injured out in the woods due to the cold. “And so the problem starts with us not recognizing emergency cold, and from a nonprofit level we have, and some level of county involvement we have,” Raddatz added. “But we don’t recognize that as an emergency, and so it doesn’t appear on a levy or a tax or an agenda or anything that gets a building that could meet the capacity requirements for a larger group.” Painesville Township Trustee Gabe Cicconetti said that the Code Blue shelters used to be offered in county buildings. “Because of the work Sub Zero does, the great work Sub Zero does, with the homeless veteran population, and they have this facility that they’ve added onto theirs and improved, they thought this would be a good place, working with the United Way and the county to facilitate this type of operation when the need presented itself,” Cicconetti said. The center needs a zoning permit from the township before it can legally operate as an overnight shelter. “Unfortunately, they were given the go-ahead by a government entity that didn’t have the jurisdiction to issue that go-ahead,” Cicconetti said. He said that once the township saw a Facebook post recently indicating that Sub Zero would be the shelter, it informed Sub Zero that it would need the permits and invited it to come in to start the process to legally operate “as soon as possible.” “We are all in favor of helping the homeless and we don’t want anybody to freeze to death and that’s why we’re helping them as much as we can through this process,” Cicconetti said. The trustees unanimously voted at their Dec. 2 meeting to approve a declaration Sub Zero needs to operate as a shelter. The township also scheduled a special Board of Zoning Appeals meeting for Dec. 15 to grant the conditional use permit that Sub Zero needs, since it was past the deadline for Sub Zero to submit permit requests to the regularly-scheduled December meeting. The township was required to give a minimum of 10 days notice for the special meeting per state law. The trustees offered for the township to cover the costs that they would normally require the applicant to pay to schedule the special meeting. “We are committed to helping them as much as we can within our legal outlines here, so we’re doing everything we can to speed this along so they can operate when needed to help people,” Cicconetti said. Raddatz previously said that he would operate the shelter before receiving the permit if conditions required. “My heart and my code tells me the right thing is to open the doors, and if it’s right in 15 days it’s right today,” he said. Sub Zero said in a Facebook post that it “appreciate(s) the township’s efforts to expedite this process where possible.” It added that Code Blue temperatures are not forecast for the next two weeks. ...read more read less