St. Anne's Center

OGDEN -- Plans to move St. Anne's Center to a location outside of downtown Ogden got a huge boost Wednesday with the announcement that The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints will donate $1.5 million to help build the new shelter complex.

"Our purpose is to care for the poor and needy, and there are needs in Ogden that we want to help," Ronald G. Humphries, the church's regional director for temporal affairs, said after announcing the donation. "For some time, we have been providing housing through the Bishop's Storehouse. That's not our area of expertise. It really should be done through the community, and we're happy to support the community." He said the donation is in keeping with admonitions from LDS Church President Thomas S. Monson that the church help the poor. "We are the Lord's hands here on the earth to help in lifting up and doing everything possible to help them," he said.

The donation was announced Wednesday morning in a brief ceremony in front of St. Anne's Center at 137 W. Binford Ave. The announcement kicked off a fundraising drive to move St. Anne's to a new location, with city-owned property at 33rd Street and Pacific Avenue the most likely destination. A site plan shows family housing, transitional housing and a homeless shelter on 5.5 acres. It will have at least 16 family rooms and an overflow sleeping area. Nobody is sure, yet, what the cost will be.

Mayor Matthew Godfrey's administration has been pushing St. Anne's to move out of central Ogden for several years. Earlier, the two announced discussions about moving St. Anne's to the Pacific Avenue site and adding more counseling services, transitional housing and family shelter space. Shelter director Jennifer Canter said 36 families are on the waiting list for the shelter's four family rooms. Families are sleeping in the parking lot, and she is putting mats on the floor of the cafeteria for them to sleep on at night.

At the event Wednesday, city officials and St. Anne's also signed a memorandum of understanding about the move. The memorandum lists what St. Anne's wants from the city as the two negotiate the move, but makes it clear that the terms are not yet agreed upon. The memorandum says new property for the center must be within walking distance of the current shelter, donated to St. Anne's, properly zoned and pass environmental inspection.

The memorandum says the current property will continue to be owned by St. Anne's. "We're going to keep this piece of property and lease it out," said Jeff Chapman, chairman of St. Anne's board of directors. "We'll demolish the building, then lease the land. It will kind of give us a revenue stream, which is one of our issues." The memorandum also says St. Anne's won't use the existing building for anything else after it is vacated, but won't be responsible for the cost of demolition.

The memorandum says a fundraising committee will include representatives from Ogden, Weber County, United Way of Northern Utah and St. Anne's. Godfrey said he and Robert Hunter, executive director of United Way, approached the LDS Church. "They were very passionate about being a part of this," Godfrey said. Godfrey, in prepared remarks, said the move of St. Anne's recognizes that the face of homelessness has changed since the current building was put up in 1995. "It wasn't that many years ago that it was a common belief among the homeless-provider community that the homeless were homeless because that's what they wanted to be," he said. The team building a new shelter, Godfrey said, "completely disagrees with that" and feels the homeless can be helped back to mainstream lives in the new facilities.

Following the ceremony, all of the officials were invited in to have lunch with the several hundred homeless and local people who eat every day at St. Anne's. Godfrey sat with Cheydene Hudspeth, a mother of eight children who has been living at the shelter since May 20. Godfrey referred to Hudspeth during the ceremony as someone who is typical of the problems St. Anne's faces these days.

Allan Heiskanen, a member of St. Anne's board of directors, said Hudspeth has been in the shelter so long because federal housing requirements say she has to be put in a home with at least five bedrooms. "Well, five-bedroom rental units don't exist," he said, "so what do you do?" Hudspeth, who is going to school, said she is hoping she'll be able to get into a home in Ogden by the end of the month.