For those experiencing homelessness, these single-digit days of December can be a mean season.

“The risk of death and substantial harm just really increases for the people outside,” explains John Tribbett, the service area director for Emergency Services Programs at Avivo. “We really focus on making sure people have what they need to stay alive and survive in this cold.”

Avivo Village in Minneapolis provides shelter and wraparound services for about 100 people.

Staffers there say they’re pleased the organization is to receive $1.6 million in city funding after the City Council’s override of Mayor Frey’s budget veto.

Tribbett says the money will help keep Avivo running for several months.

“We’re just really happy we’re going to be able to get the support that we need to financially continue operations,” he says. “These are the critical services that help get people off the streets and into permanent housing and really work towards a long-term solution to homelessness.”

Mayor Frey’s recommended budget offered at least $9.8 million for affordable housing and homeless response, including subsidizing rental properties and police response.

The City Council added $1.6 million for things like portable bathrooms and hand washing stations in encampments, and employment programs.

“I knew that if we weren’t able to override, the impact on unsheltered homelessness would be huge,” Ward Nine Council Member Jason Chavez says. “You know, this is the number one issue impacting our residents and it’s not even a political game anymore; it’s about ‘Do we want to do the right thing or not?’”

He says the budget will now include emergency housing vouchers for 50 residents and 50 families.

There’s also funding for the Midtown-Phillips Neighborhood, the Little Earth area and the Hiawatha and Whittier neighborhoods for community outreach, including the use of violence interrupters.

A public health specialist is to be hired to search for and collect hypodermic needles near encampments.

Chavez says housing is the best way to resolve the cycle of encampment clearings and resettlement.

“Of course, there are going to be people that do not want to move indoors, and there are many different solutions to that,” he notes. “We need the right type of housing. We need to be focused on building low-barrier housing because that is the best way to get someone indoors.”

But Mayor Frey appears to be clearly frustrated with the veto override, saying the council ‘gutted’ some amendments.  

“One of them is our ability to prevent homeless encampments from forming to begin with,” he told reporters. “Send me a proposal that will allow us to connect people experiencing unsheltered homelessness to shelters, addiction treatment, care and homes, and yes, give us also the ability to not continuously have homeless encampments.”

Frey says he’s especially concerned about $100,000 taken out of the budget by the council, which includes funding to clear encampments.

The mayor calls it a security contract.

He referred to an encampment fire along 15^th Avenue South on Tuesday night.

RELATED: 8 adults displaced after encampment fire spreads to Minneapolis home

“It happened just the other day, where a number of flammable tanks exploded. The home next door burned up,” Frey declared. “This is not a safe scenario, and so we need the ability to remove homeless encampments and then to secure them. They cut that.”

Funding for city departments begins on Jan. 1 and organizations that have completed contracts will receive funding after that.

Tribbett says he’s grateful for the funding and hopes it will make a difference.

“There’s always going to be the challenge of not knowing for sure how we’re going to be able to finance a program long-term,” he explains. “Really, it’s just working with whatever elected officials in a way where we can find that shared collaboration and we can work towards a solution.”