B.C. civil rights watchdogs say planned legislation to force people into homeless shelters is little more than a veiled attempt to clean up Vancouver streets before the 2010 Olympic Games.

The proposal, announced Monday, would allow police to take homeless people into shelters during "extreme" weather.

"It seems that this is completely related to getting the homeless out of the streets and out of the view of tourists during the Olympic Games," David Eby, director of the BC Civil Liberties Association, said.

Eby says the timing is highly suspect.

"It'll be ready just in time for the Olympics. It'll be too soon for it to be subject to constitutional challenge to strike down the law as unconstitutional before the Olympics."

B.C.'s Housing Minister denies the legislation has anything to do with cleaning up the city.

"It's about giving the police the tool to say 'you could freeze to death out here tonight, let me take you to the door of a shelter, meet with a worker,'" he said.

Coleman adds the move would only force people to the door of the shelter - not force them to stay.

He says the government began considering the law after a Vancouver woman burned to death last winter in a fire she started in an attempt to keep warm.

The woman, known only as Tracy, refused to be taken to a shelter. On the night she died, Vancouver Police had offered shelter space to 101 people, but 12 refused.

Homeless advocates say the legislation may actually be dangerous to people like Tracy who go out of their way to avoid going into shelters for the night, no matter what the weather.

"If homeless people think they will be forced into shelters or jail for sleeping outside, they may decide to sleep in 'out of the way places' that are more dangerous than sleeping where a lot of eyes are on the street," Wendy Pederson of the Carnegie Community Action Project said.

"Women, especially, could be in more danger because of the proposed policy."

Eby says his group will be monitoring the wording of the legislation closely.

"As soon as it comes out we're going to monitor the constitutionality of it and we'll be working with other groups that work together with the homeless to mount a constitutional challenge," he said.

Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson says he's not sure the law is necessary and the real problem is a lack of shelter space. He says the current number of shelter beds isn't enough to house all of Vancouver's homeless, which he expects will reach 1,000 this winter.

"Well I'm very sympathetic to the intentions here but I'm not going to make a judgment on it until I see what it is and I'm assured there is no charter or legal implications here," he said.

Robertson said he won't commit support until he knows the capacity issue is addressed.