Unalaska, AK – A group in Unalaska recently made public their plans to build a short-term housing shelter for men in downtown Unalaska at the site of the old Elbow Room bar. Project planner Mark Horne said it will be a ten to 15-bed facility that allows men to sleep over night but does not allow drugs or alcohol or loitering during the day. Residents who live near the proposed site, like Suzi Golodoff, do not think it is a good location.

"So what happens to the guys that come over who are too drunk or too doped up to stay there? They're in the neighborhood now, aren't they?" said Golodoff, who was speaking on behalf of the neighborhood as a whole. "And where are they going to go? They're going to be camping in my shed or my truck or maybe in the little empty buildings around here, wandering around. The neighbors I've talked to were alarmed frankly. We're alarmed, we're worried about it. We're tired of what we went through with the bar."

Golodoff lived directly next door to the bar in her husband's childhood home for more than 30 years. She said the noise would keep her awake at night and drunken people would sleep in the neighborhood's cars and sheds. She didn't feel safe walking outside of her house at night.

"We had to put up with things that nobody else put up with. And now that that bar is closed and the liquor license is sold, the peace and quite that's come over the neighborhood has been so welcome to us."

Golodoff said she doesn't want to compromise the new safety she feels in her home, especially as a woman living alone, by having strangers come back into the neighborhood. She and her neighbors are also concerned about fire hazards - the men who can't stay at the shelter might start small fires near the old wood homes to keep warm. Golodoff said she supports the idea of a shelter but not in the middle of a primarily residential area near the preschool and the Russian Orthodox Church.

Mark Horne said in a previous interview that he had contacted architects to design the new building for that plot of land. He would not release any more planning details yet and is not coordinating with other organizations in town. Currently, no one has contacted the planning and zoning board at City Hall about building a new structure on the lot.