FRUIT HEIGHTS, Utah (KUTV) – A new plan to bus homeless people to a neighborhood in Fruit Heights in Davis County has left residents shocked, and the city’s mayor said they didn’t need to know.

A church is partnering with the county to become a warming center during nights when temperatures drop to 18 degrees for two hours or more over a 24-hour period, known as a Code Blue Alert.

Many people recently discovered that Mountain Road Church agreed to become a Code Blue shelter for homeless people across the county, and now residents are wondering why.

During a recent city council meeting in which it was revealed that the council was aware of the plan, the mayor said there was no reason to notify residents.

Resident Scott Heusser describes Fruit Heights as a “sleepy community.”

“We don’t have a police department, we don’t have InstaCare, we don’t even have a fire department,” Heusser said. “Can’t find a Maverik around here.”

So for him, he doesn’t have the services to support a warming center.

The proposed plan is to bus people from all over Davis County to church starting at 7:00 pm on a Code Blue Alert night.

At 7:00 a.m. they will board the bus again and will be taken back to the place where they were picked up. A sheriff’s deputy will be on the bus and will provide security in the area.

The rules say people will not be allowed to leave unless it is an emergency, and they must leave in the morning.

KUTV asked Heusser how confident he is that all of this will happen.

“That doesn’t give me a lot of confidence,” he said.

This plan is an agreement between the church and the county, so the city cannot do anything under state law.

“We didn’t start it, we can’t stop it, but I fully support it,” Mayor John Pohlman said during an October council meeting.

Although the meeting took place last month, Heusser and other residents did not realize what was happening until early November.

“I had no idea this was happening,” Heusser said.

MORE ON SHELTERING THE HOMELESS IN UTAH:

At that same Oct. 15 meeting, a council member asked Pohlman if the city needed to alert residents.

“Transparency with the residents and the city, are we going to try to implement this or let people know in advance? Or do they just see a bus show up once and people get furious?” the councilman asked.

“There is no transparency,” Pohlman said.

Pohlman went on to say that the city had nothing to do with this so they didn’t need to tell the residents and 99% of the city wouldn’t even know what was happening.

He also said the church didn’t need to tell anyone either.

“They won’t,” the mayor said. “It’s not their responsibility to let the community know what’s happening.”

KUTV contacted the city and was told that both the mayor and city manager were unavailable.

They gave us a contact for the county, but we didn’t hear back from them either.

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