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Orange County supervisors voted unanimously Tuesday to purchase a property in an industrial area of east Santa Ana with the idea that the site would become the county's first year -round homeless shelter. The move drew praise from homeless advocates, but also criticism from residents who live near the proposed site, as well as some supervisors, over what was described as a poor job of outreach by county officials. "It's been a long time coming - there's been a lot of suffering" over last few years, said Tim Houchen, a spokesman for the homeless advocacy group Civic Center Roundtable. "People actually die out here at the Civic Center." Orange County is among the largest metropolitan areas in America without a year -round homeless shelter, and Santa Ana tops the list of potential locations for a shelter largely because its City Council is supportive and its downtown Civic Center already serves as an encampment for hundreds of homeless people. Yet the planning process has left several residents and supervisors feeling left out of the loop. Only one community, forum was held on the proposed shelter site and notice for the July 2 meeting didn't come until two days beforehand, said Santa Ana resident Dora Lopez. "The approach that was taken did not give us an opportunity for input," Lopez said, echoing concerns by several other residents who spoke at the meeting. To her, that was "pretty much telling us it's a done deal." About a half dozen other Santa Ana residents shared similar sentiments. "I'm here representing a lot of my community that are seniors and not English speakers. None of us were informed ... I found out about this yesterday," said Laura Garcia. "If it's going to be in our back yard, we should know," a Civic Center Roundtable representatives complained about a lack of "The Civic Center Roundtable was never consulted" as part of the community engagement y�( process, said Massimo M ' " an_advocate with Civic Center Roundtable. "We really disagree '�� °°" with the fact at yo�h u really didn't inform the community that we " Yet supervisors' Chairman Shawn Nelson said the fact that people showed up to Tuesday's meeting showed that the community was informed. "That's odd you just happen to be in the lobby today," said Nelson. But some of Nelson's colleagues sided with those complaining about the lack of notice.