Losing its direction

For six months or so I've been volunteering at a homeless shelter in Bristol. The £1.6million Compass Centre is pretty much brand new, opened last May with a flourish from the local council. But now it's closing. Despite the fact that more than 20 and up to 30 people sleep there every night.Officially, there are only two rough sleepers in Bristol, but I, and all the other volunteers, know that this simply isn't true. Any council member who bothered to visit and talk to the people it helps, the staff or the volunteers would have to agree. This isn't going to be an irate post - the takeover of the centre is a done deal - but why close a well-run, busy night shelter? Why close a shelter that people feel safe in, and instead consign them to the streets or a scramble for beds in the city's only other shelter? Is money that important?