There’s been some discussion in recent days about whether the city needs a homeless shelter.

Selma Mayor George Evans was the first to point out that any discussions are still in the early stages and that there is a lot of information the city still doesn’t have.

Before moving forward into any serious talks, the city would want to find out just how many homeless people there are actually are in Selma.

“We’re trying to pull all of the numbers together and get some agencies to get involved who would like to help with the project,” Evans said. “It’s a work in progress.”

From the information we’ve gathered and the organizations we’ve talked to, the biggest need in the city could be in short-term housing. There are several local nonprofit groups who help with this need, but its just part of their bigger overall mission and not their main focus.

A short-term solution would be for a family that lost its home in a fire or for someone that was evicted from their home.

However, that isn’t to say that there aren’t many in our city that don’t have a place to call home. There many be dozens of homeless people in Selma and then again, there might not be.

That’s our point. Before moving forward into any serious talks, the city needs to know exactly what the statistics are.

The next meeting on the project is scheduled for June 24 at the Edmundite Missions, located at 1428 Broad Street at 10 a.m. The meeting is open to the community.