The Lawrence Community Shelter is pictured in this file photo from 2012.

To keep 125 residents safe each night, the Lawrence Community Shelter has the challenge of finding the right balance between preventing potential harm and welcoming those in need.

Trey Meyer, the shelter’s interim director of operations and director of program development, said Friday that the only “black and white” rule of shelter intake is that anyone listed as a registered sex offender is not allowed to be a guest. All other factors, such as criminal history, are decided on a case-by-case basis.

“We want to know everything to be able to decide if a (potential guest) would be a good fit (at the shelter),” Meyer said. “Just because you have a criminal history doesn’t mean you can’t turn things around.”

But though the shelter has a screening process in place, it can’t prevent all possible problems.

In May, an adult male shelter resident was arrested after a 14-year-old female shelter resident claimed the man followed her into her room and tried to entice her into having sex with him, according to an arrest affidavit in the case.

The man, a 28-year-old, was charged with indecent solicitation of a child and interference with law enforcement following the allegation, and is currently in the Douglas County Jail on a $30,000 bond.

Prior to his arrest, the man had allegedly been lying about his identity “because he thought he had a warrant out of Mississippi,” according to the affidavit. At his first appearance, prosecutors revealed the man was wanted in Washington County, Mississippi, on an armed robbery charge.

Meyer said the shelter has no way to check for warrants, and that most criminal history must be divulged by guests. Shelter staff do check the sexual offender registry and use the Kansas Department of Correction’s public online criminal justice information system.

To help keep children safe, families and single adults are assigned to separate housing areas, Meyer said. Of the 125 total guests at the shelter Friday, 36 of them were with a family.

“We don’t permit single adults to roam through the family side,” Meyer said.

But if the allegations are true, the man charged with indecent liberties with a child again fell through the cracks of that safeguard, as well. Both he and the 14-year-old alleged victim had families in the shelter, according to the affidavit, so the man was presumably expected to be in the family housing area where the solicitation is alleged to have occurred.

Though problems can arise, Meyer said the shelter works diligently to protect its guests and help them to get back on their feet.

“We will never knowingly subject our guests to potential harm,” Meyer said.

Meyer said that if the shelter refused beds to all potential guests with criminal histories, many people in need would go unserved.

“Every person is different, and just because a person has had difficulties in the past doesn’t mean they can’t turn the corner,” Meyer said, “and we want to help them do that.”