HELENA — Demolition is underway at Family Promise for a shelter for the unhoused, but the two organizations partnering on the project are no longer working together.
"We really had put in place the mechanisms to run the shelter alone as Family Promise," said Renee Bauer, executive director of Family Promise. "It wasn't that hard for us to backtrack and go, 'Okay, we go back to our core and do what we know how to do best, and that is have a shelter.'"
Family Promise partnered with Good Samaritan Ministries on what was originally Ruth's Place women's shelter.
The two joined together after the building where Ruth's Place was originally going to go was sold, and Family Promise had the space to accommodate what Good Samaritan proposed.
Now, Family Promise executive director Renee Bauer tells MTN that Good Samaritan has stepped back from the project.
Bauer says she was told it was so the non-profit could focus on its thrift store and Our Place programs.
"Good Samaritan has never been in the shelter business," she said, "So I think it was kind of a stretch for them."
The shelter will have 16 rooms with two separate entrances - half for families with children and the other half for women.
Bauer says Good Samaritan signed over the grant from the Montana Department of Commerce to Family Promise, and they say the shelter is 80% funded.
"That makes a big difference. It helps a lot," Bauer said.
She has been waiting for the demolition to begin to move forward with the project.
"It's very exciting," Bauer said. "The concept for a dedicated shelter in the community has been rattling around for years with us."
If everything goes according to plan, the shelter could be open by December.
Everyone typically using the Family Promise building has been out for the last eight to nine months.
"We're sheltering folks in our rotational program, and they stay at the partnering churches in the community," said Bauer.
