A group representing the homeless is asking to use the Athletes Village for next year's Tokyo Olympics as a shelter during the coronavirus pandemic.
An online petition addressed to Tokyo Olympic organizers and the city government has drawn tens of thousands of signatures for permission to occupy the massive housing complex going up alongside Tokyo Bay.
The village was to be home to 11,000 Olympic athletes and 4,400 Paralympic athletes. It is largely complete and empty with the Olympic opening postponed by the virus outbreak until July 23, 2021.
"We don't know how long this downturn will last, and so we have to change how we think," Ren Ohnishi, chairperson of the Moyai Support Center for Independent Living, told Associated Press.
"That includes how we work, how we deal with housing, how we give aid to those who need it."
The petition reads in part: "If the outbreak continues for some time, many people may fall into poverty or lose their homes."
"Our society is being tested. In Japan, many people still blame the poor as causing their own plight."