Civic leaders, including Mayor Chris Coleman, on Friday morning launched a campaign to build three new facilities to replace St. Paul's aging and overcrowded Dorothy Day Center for the homeless.
The project, expected to cost $64 million, emerged out of recommendations from a mayoral task force to broaden and enhance the services provided by Dorothy Day, which began as a drop-in center more than 30 years ago and whose expanding mission since has overtaken its capacity at its downtown St. Paul location.
The new facilities — which would include a shelter, transitional and permanent housing, and a resource center for the poor and homeless — will provide "a gigantic leap forward … the best of the city of St. Paul," Coleman said at the announcement at Dorothy Day.
Catholic Charities CEO Tim Marx called it "a new day for Dorothy Day."
The announcement matched the spirit of a plan announced Thursday by state leaders to prevent and end homelessness statewide. That plan proposes more funding for affordable and supportive housing and rental assistance, more effective jobs programs and better coordination of social services.
Dollar figures haven't yet been assigned to much of the plan, although there is support for $100 million in housing infrastructure bonds in the coming legislative session — $17 million of which Catholic Charities hopes to use for the first phase of its Dorothy Day plan, along with $22 million in general obligation bonds that St. Paul hopes to get from the state.
The first phase, costing an estimated $39 million, would include two buildings across Interstate 94 from downtown St. Paul's northeast quadrant. One would be a facility offering a range of housing options (from shelter to apartments) for 470 people, similar to Catholic Charities' innovative Higher Ground building in Minneapolis; the other would be an adjacent Connection Center offering services such as computer labs, job referrals, meals and housing resources.
The second phase of the project, tagged at $24 million, would build permanent housing to replace and supplement deteriorating units in the downtown core. The preferred site would be near the current Dorothy Day Center, off W. 7th Street near the Xcel arena.