The Aston unhoused shelter will begin admitting tenants early next week after a year of postponements, District officials announced Monday.

Department of Human Services Deputy Administrator Anthony Newman said at a Monday Community Advisory Team meeting that The Aston, a former GW residence hall on New Hampshire Avenue that D.C. officials purchased to convert into a noncongregate unhoused shelter, will admit its first residents early next week, with the goal of moving 50 in by Thanksgiving. After more than a year of delays due to the officials’ difficulties securing a provider, lawsuits attempting to block the shelter’s opening and a failed building inspection, the shelter is set to open less than two weeks after hypothermia season began on Nov. 1.

“We are preparing to open the building,” Newman said. “We are looking forward to bringing in our first group of the first cohort as early as Tuesday and Wednesday of next week.”

Most recently, officials slated the shelter’s opening for Oct. 1 but pushed back the date for the fifth time after the building failed a D.C. housing code inspection for lacking sufficient fire exits and door closers at the entrances of each unit.

When District officials announced the indefinite delay a week before tenants were slated to move in, Newman said it was possible that the 50 tenants queued up to move in the week of Oct. 1 may not be the same group that eventually moves in. Members of the public and of the CAT voiced concerns at the meeting because they said door closers were not a sufficient reason to leave unhoused people living on the streets.

Interim CAT co-chair Sakina Thompson said The Aston received a conditional Certificate of Occupancy — a District-issued document required to open the shelter, which officials did not initially grant due to the failed inspection — on Oct. 25 that will be in effect for 90 days. Thompson said the temporary certificate will allow the contractor to complete final upgrades to The Aston while tenants move in.

“What that means is we were approved to go fully operational while we complete some work that has to be done,” Thompson said.

Thompson said officials are making “small changes” to the shelter to comply with regulations. She said The Aston initially met the accessibility requirements mandated by the District but because the project received federal funding, DGS must update units in the shelter to meet U.S. accessibility guidelines, not just the International Building code.

Thompson also said officials are waiting for the parts needed to make the elevator functional and to operationalize the manual generator switch. She said the temporary certificate will give officials enough time to complete the upgrades.

“The 90 days that’s given in this CO is sufficient to allow for the additional items to be completed and that the permanent CO would be applied for before it expires,” Thompson said.

The Aston will open its doors in the midst of ongoing legal action and appeals from an unincorporated group of West End locals. Most recently, in October, the group challenged the D.C. Department of Building’s decision to grant The Aston a building permit — the group’s third attempt to thwart the shelter’s opening.

Newman said there is already a waitlist for unhoused people eager to move into The Aston and potential tenants will be selected through the D.C.’s Coordinated Assessment and Housing Placement process.

“We have more people on our list and beds available to them right now,” Newman said.

Tenants who are placed by DHS in The Aston based on a match system must work with a case manager who will help them transfer into more affordable permanent housing, connect with friends and family or apply for rapid rehousing, federal or veteran resources, according to a DHS handout distributed at a September CAT meeting.

“We provide an opportunity for them to make referrals through a referral process, and that comes into the back end, where my team scours that list and sees if those folks are meeting that criteria and then assigns them as being eligible for a particular bridge housing based upon the criteria that they met there meet,” Newman said.

Co-chair Jim Malec also brought the Good Neighbor Agreement, a document outlining the expectations neighbors and The Aston’s tenants will have for each other, to a vote for a second time. The advisory team voted unanimously on Oct. 10 to approve the Good Neighbor Agreement, but Malec said Monday that the meeting wasn’t recorded on the record, so he and Thompson wanted to hold a revote to be procedurally correct.

Malec said the Good Neighbor Agreement did not undergo any changes from the version presented in October.

“In the interest of making sure that we’re doing everything by the book and being transparent, and, you know, following the law, following every regulation that we’re supposed to, we’re going to revote on the Good Neighbor protocol,” Malec said.

The 13 CAT members in attendance voted Monday to unanimously pass the Good Neighbor Agreement.