For years Roanoke has attracted the homeless of Western Virginia.

They come for different reasons, but probably the biggest is the city's level of care, which has been provided for the most part not by the government but by charitable organizations.

On Monday, however, members of the Roanoke City Council indicated they may be ready for the city to play a larger role. They're not prepared for the city to take over the care of Roanoke's homeless people, but they do want more say in how groups such as the Roanoke Rescue Mission and Roanoke Area Ministries do so.

The chief executive officer of the Rescue Mission said she welcomed the scrutiny but warned council members not to look for an easy solution.

"I've been doing this a long time, and it's not going to be a simplistic answer," Joy Sylvester-Johnson said. "People want a quick-fix answer, and that's not going to happen in this case."

The council's discussion was prompted by the results of a January survey of homeless adults in shelters around the region, most in Roanoke. The survey showed an increase of 363 percent in shelter occupancy from 1987 to this year. Though most of those surveyed said they had been in Roanoke longer than six months, 41 percent said they had moved to the city after becoming homeless.

Councilman Bev Fitzpatrick said he was fed up with the city receiving homeless people from surrounding localities and states.

"It's about the fact that we're letting people come here because we're too daggone nice," he said. "They find out about it, and they're coming. We've got to corral that. I just say plug it, somehow, so we're doing the right thing for the people of this valley who need us and we're not doing it for everyone else."

The trend of sending homeless people to the city dates back decades, when rural judges often treated their local homeless people through "bus therapy" -- giving them a one-way ticket to Roanoke. Fitzpatrick said his father, a judge, used that approach for drunks in Wytheville. But he said the level of services provided by local shelters further encourages the problem.

"This is a community-driven problem, and part of the problem is the very people who say they're helping," Fitzpatrick said. "No one wants to say anything negative about them because they're wonderful people, but the reputation of Roanoke is out, and we're becoming a magnet for these kinds of folks for not just the region but for far beyond the region. ... Some of the people on boards of these organizations that take care of these folks are not aware of the significance of the issue that they are creating in their own hometown."

Mayor Nelson Harris agreed that providing more services is a "no-win spiral" that will result in attracting even more homeless. Instead, the city should take a tougher stance with surrounding localities, he said.

Roanoke needs to "take some tough steps saying to our friends and neighbors in Western Virginia, 'If we find we've got your citizens here benefiting from our services, you ought to pay up. Or we send them back, and you take care of them,' " Harris said.

Another issue discussed by the council is the daily "migration" of homeless individuals from the Rescue Mission, a night shelter, through downtown to RAM House, a day shelter.

"We know that in hot weather and cold weather, the main library and the market area and other areas essentially become de facto day shelters," Harris said.

The council took no vote or decisive action on the discussion on the issue. Instead, Harris and City Manager Darlene Burcham plan to visit local homeless shelters in coming weeks and discuss possible solutions.

Sylvester-Johnson said she welcomes that.

"I would really like for the city manager and the mayor and the city council to come to the Rescue Mission to sit down, take a tour and then share with us ideas they have about how we could do our jobs better," she said.

Homeless numbers are up in cities across the country, she said -- it's not just Roanoke. And she said the council seems to be blowing the daily migration of homeless people to the RAM House out of proportion.

About 320 people were staying at the shelter Monday night, Sylvester-Johnson said. Only about 25 of them will head to the RAM House this morning, she said. Most will go to jobs after having to stay in the shelter. Many of those who stay at the shelter work two or three jobs but have trouble balancing their pay with utilities and rent.

"They're doing everything they can to get on their feet. You don't even know they're homeless, because they're the people bagging your groceries, serving you at McDonald's, cleaning your office at night," Sylvester-Johnson said. "If one thing goes wrong, they end up homeless.

"Homelessness is a huge problem," she added. "It involves real lives, real men, real women, real children -- and they suffer. And when we can't get a fix on it, it's frustrating."