Bedbugs impacting homeless shelter in Gastonia

GASTONIA, N.C. — People who rely on the Salvation Army for a safe and dry place to sleep said the Gastonia shelter has a bedbug problem.

The bites from bedbugs are so bad that people are no longer staying at the shelter.

"We have done what we can right now to combat the bedbugs. Apparently they are getting the upper hand," said Maj. Timothy Carter with the Salvation Army.

Benjie Nichols took video at the Salvation Army shelter and said bedbugs were in the frame of his bed at the shelter.

"It was just startling. It just blew my mind. It was inhumane," Nichols said.

Nichols remembers reports of bedbugs at the shelter when he stayed there two years ago. He now has his own place, but when he heard they were back, he checked in and brought his phone.

"I just pulled up through my camera and started recording," Nichols said. "They were even crawling across the floor, it was so bad."

A relative of one woman sent Channel 9 a photograph showing bites on her skin from bedbugs. The woman, however, did not want to speak on camera.

Salvation Army officials didn't want to go on camera either, but they admit they have been in a constant battle with bedbugs.

The people who stayed here put boric acid on the mattresses to kill the bedbugs, but it is harmful if inhaled.

The shelter director said in the past year they have spent more than $11,000 on new mattresses and pesticides to kill the bedbugs. They have even voluntarily shut down twice to fumigate but the bugs return in a couple of months.

Carter said the bugs come in on the homeless who often sleep in several different places before they find a home at the shelter.

"They could put those people somewhere and exterminate," Nichols said.

The shelter director said shutting it down is his last resort.

The county health inspector said there is nothing he can do about situation -- because they are a nonprofit and don't charge, the state does not consider the Salvation Army a place of lodging.