Plans for a low-barrier shelter that homeless advocates say would have significantly eased street homelessness in the city have collapsed as the result of a dispute between county commissioners and Mayor Monroe Nichols.

The shelter would have been at the site of the vacant Tulsa County Juvenile Center, 315 S. Gilcrease Museum Road.

The stalemate has put in the balance an $18 million commitment from a philanthropic foundation to build the new homeless shelter.

The county, which owns the property, wanted $1 million plus another $2.1 million for security upgrades related to adjoining operations, which Nichols says is exorbitant.

“The county seems very uninterested in the city,” he said Friday. “They proposed something I couldn’t possibly say yes to.”

County Commission Chairman Lonnie Sim

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