Sweet Home city councilor Lisa Gourley expressed a desire at a Nov. 15 Community Health Committee meeting to get a homeless shelter “up and going” on the city’s Public Works property by Dec. 1.

“I hope we are able to meet those hard-weather deadlines,” she said. “People are going to be wet and cold if we don’t.”

City staff have been preparing to establish a “temporary” homeless shelter on the site, with hopes of building a more permanent “sleep center” on the former Willamette Industries mill site behind Bi-Mart in the coming months.

A key step toward that goal was t...