When they started bringing bunk beds into a small apartment building across from their school, teachers at a Bedford Park elementary school knew something was amiss.

Sure enough, the owners of 3001 Briggs Ave., a 25-unit, five-story apartment building directly across the street from PS 8, are in the process of transforming the building into a transitional housing shelter for homeless families.

PS 8 teachers and other community members have already begun to organize against the shelter plan because they don’t feel it’s an appropriate use of the space, especially considering its location across from an elementary school. They are also upset that the owners didn’t publicly vet their plans with the community.

There is also a strong belief that the owners of the building, Howard and Yaakov Miller of Briggs Realty, LLC (which is based in Brooklyn), are completing the renovations under false pretenses.

In Briggs Realty’s work permit application, which the Buildings Department approved on April 8 of last year, it says there will no change in occupancy or use once the renovations are completed, according to agency documents. The building is currently classified as a walk-up apartment building.

Briggs Realty could not be reached for comment by press time, but representatives from Aguila, Inc., a nonprofit homeless services organization run by Peter Rivera (the son of Bronx Assemblyman Peter Rivera), agreed to discuss plans for the new shelter at Community Board 7’s Land Use Committee meeting on Thursday, Jan. 22, according to the board’s district manager, Fernando Tirado. (Aguila also did not return calls seeking comment for this article.)

For the past couple of weeks, PS 8 teachers have bombarded Tirado’s office with calls. “A lot of people are upset about it and rightly so,” Tirado said. 

Tirado’s hoping Aguila officials answer some burning questions, including whether ownership pushed out previous tenants to make way for the homeless shelter, something Tirado said would be unacceptable. According to Tirado, there are still tenants occupying four units in the building. Do they know they might soon be living with homeless families? Also, if homeless families with elementary school kids are moving in, will the Department of Education send them to PS 8, an extremely overcrowded school to begin with?

Tirado said Aguila has a $3.3 million contract with the city’s Department of Homeless Services to manage and operate a shelter out of 3001 Briggs Ave. and another one nearby at 2903 Valentine Ave.

John Reilly, the executive director of Fordham Bedford Housing Services, said the biggest problem is that the city is taking away permanent housing to introduce temporary housing. “It’s counterproductive,” he said. “The city’s done this before. They get the best bang for their buck in the Bronx.”