The city plans to shut down Tent City, its open-air homeless camp downtown, once the new center on Sunrise Boulevard opens in January. Closing the tent area will spell trouble, said Arnold Abbott, founder of the Love Thy Neighbor feeding program.

``It's going to explode,'' Abbott said. ``You can't feed people seven days a week and then suddenly cut that off. What do you think they are going to do to survive?''

They remain confident that most of the camp's residents will be absorbed into the new 200-bed center, 640 E. Sunrise Blvd., and that others will be helped by churches and mental health agencies.

``Tent City has been a nest of crime for years,'' said Steve Werthman, who coordinates the county's homeless programs. ``We're replacing that with a place where people will be in a supervised environment.'' That is precisely the supervision that Samuel Knowles, a 41-year-old homeless man living in Tent City, said he will reject. ``I am not going. I know that much,'' Knowles said. Sitting shirtless on a cot decorated with milk crates and a gray rug, Knowles said he would return to sleeping in doorways or under bridges when Tent City closes. He believes the new center will have too many rules _ such as a nighttime curfew.

``That's why I don't stay at the Salvation Army. Sometimes freedom is worth its weight in gold.'' That feeling was echoed by another man stretched out on a cot on a sweltering afternoon.

``All these people here are going to end up back on the streets,'' said Sean, 32, who refused to give his last name.

``There's a lot of unanswered questions people here have about how the place will be run,'' said another homeless man, Kenneth Bonneman, 60. ``It depends on how they finally decide to set things up.'' Tent City opened in 1993 following a federal court ruling in Miami that cities must provide a place for homeless people to congregate without automatically facing arrest. The area houses between 100 and 400 people. But since the camp opened, crime has been a regular problem. Residents have long complained about the unsightliness of having a homeless camp across the street from City Hall.

The new Homeless Assistance Center is designed to change that. In addition to providing beds, the new center promises a range of programs, from job training to mental health treatment. Care providers say such programs are a humane response to the complex web of problems that lead to homelessness. Such assistance helps people become stable again. ``There has to be structure,'' said Alan Reesor, director of the Broward Outreach Program in Hollywood. The one-year-old program offers a range of rehabilitation programs. As a condition for housing, it requires its 77 residents to do chores such as washing dishes.

``There's nowhere in life where you get away with doing whatever you want,'' Reesor said.