The city’s plan to build container-style shelter units at Sand Island for the chronically homeless is a “piecemeal” approach and will only shift the problem from one area of the island to another, the district’s City Council member said.

Councilman Joey Manahan said he cannot support the plan, unveiled Tuesday by Mayor Kirk Caldwell, which would place 25 modified shipping containers on a vacant lot to provide emergency housing for 75 to 100 homeless for about two months each as service providers work with them to transition into more permanent housing.  

“Without a definite plan of how the homeless on Kapalama Canal will be relocated to Sand Island and into permanent housing, I cannot support this proposal,” Manahan said in a written statement. “All this proposal will do is expand the homeless problem from one part of my district to another.