Faced with family problems he won't discuss, [Jesse Knudson] couldn't stay at home anymore, and he says without the friendly faces and support he got at the shelter, he doesn't know where he'd be today.

"I don't know if I'd be here at all," says Knudson, who will celebrate his 25th birthday next week.

Kids don't just get into trouble during business hours, said [Erma Chapman]. To be able to operate safely, the shelter needs at least three workers and a supervisor on each shift. That allows enough supervision of the teens in the shelter to ensure it isn't a place where gangs recruit members or drugs are bought and sold, said Chapman.