St. Paul: Luther Seminary cancels Safe Space shelter deal with Ramsey County

Frederick Melo, Pioneer Press
Updated ·7 min read
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In light of heavy community opposition, Luther Seminary announced it had canceled plans to relocate Ramsey County’s 64-bed overnight emergency shelter from downtown St. Paul to its long-vacant Stub Hall dormitory in St. Anthony Park.

Seminary officials met Monday morning with Keith Lattimore, the county’s director of Housing Stability, and Kizzy Downie, chief executive officer of nonprofit partner Model Cities, to break them the news.

“Yes, it was a surprise,” said Lattimore, who had been poised to present transportation plans and other details to area residents this week at a community town hall. “It was unfortunate there wasn’t even a chance to get to do that. It was a surprise to us this morning.”

City and county officials, as well as shelter managers with Model Cities, had planned a community outreach meeting in the heavily-residential neighborhood on Tuesday evening. That meeting has been canceled, as has the county’s three-year lease, which was poised to take effect as soon as July 1.

“After receiving feedback from its neighbors, Luther Seminary has decided to cease its negotiations with Ramsey County,” read an announcement issued by the seminary. “Stub Hall will remain vacant as the Seminary continues its plans to sell the property.”

Safe Space

The county, with the blessing of the city mayor’s office and the management of Model Cities, had planned 64 men and women’s beds, showers and daytime lockers to be used as their new emergency “Safe Space” shelter for homeless people removed from light rail cars and other spaces late at night. Lattimore said visitors would have been shuttled each morning to the Union Gospel Mission and the Dorothy Day Place/the St. Paul Opportunity Center.

The county has operated Safe Space in a downtown government building at 160 E. Kellogg Boulevard in both winter and year-round capacities since 2017, and with Model Cities as a partner since 2019, but that office building is being cleared out and positioned for sale.

Ramsey County Commissioner Trista Martinson, who chairs the Ramsey County Board and represents the St. Anthony Park neighborhood, emphasized that the county has been searching for a new home for Safe Space in the capital city or its first-ring suburbs for the past nine months, and is now back to square one.

“We’re working hard and fast and frantically to find a partner … that could provide dignified accommodations for 64 residents each night,” said Martinson, noting while Safe Space is exclusively for night-time rest, the appropriate facility would still need sufficient bathrooms. “We need to work quickly. The government building they’re currently in is not ideal. We do have a plan to sell it. … We have vulnerable residents that need to be housed.”

Martinson later issued a lengthy statement in the county’s District 3 newsletter calling the loss of the location a major setback for the most vulnerable: “All across our city, I see brightly colored signs declaring that ‘ALL ARE WELCOME HERE.’ Now I wonder how much we really mean it.”

Dormitory previously housed homeless

Through a previous lease with Ramsey County, Stub Hall’s Hendon Avenue dormitory had housed homeless women and couples from December 2020 to June 2022, at a time the numbers of unsheltered homeless soared downtown, in part because shelters were limiting occupancy and many couch-hoppers were no longer welcome to stay with friends and family.

Some neighbors who had initially been supportive of that leasing arrangement said that the situation deteriorated with time, as loitering men came to check on their girlfriends and other signs of vagrancy, littering and drug use escalated. Stub Hall has been vacant since June 30, 2022.

St. Anthony Park residents opposed to the new three-year lease, including a land use attorney, questioned why more outreach had not taken place before finalizing the new shelter arrangement, which was presented on the Luther Seminary and Ramsey County websites as final and poised to take effect this summer. Officials with the St. Anthony Park Community Council told residents they had been unaware of the county’s plans until they were announced.

“From a public policy standpoint, where has that ever worked?” said Zev Radziwill, executive director of the community council. “Neighbors are willing to help. But solving the problem means talking to each other. This is not a case of ‘Not in my backyard’ NIMBY-ism. This is a case of lack of communication and transparency.”

Residents also questioned the lack of services available for the homeless on the western edges of the city, so far from downtown.

“This is a neighborhood of people who would welcome the opportunity to collaborate with Ramsey County about ways in which we can help solve the worsening homelessness crisis,” said Kristina Halvorson, a St. Anthony Park resident, on Monday. “However, moving a 64-bed low-barrier emergency … shelter onto a residential street — without access to any sort of supportive daytime services or facilities — is neither practical nor sustainable for any neighborhood. And that’s why the city ordinances are already in place. How did plans progress to this point without anyone pointing that out?”

Land-use rules questioned

Attorneys and others familiar with the city’s efforts to allow homeless shelters and other public-facing services at churches and religious institutions questioned whether the county was abiding by the city’s “religious accessory use” zoning codes, which since 2022 have limited overnight shelters on church grounds to 25 people without a conditional use permit.

While part of Luther Seminary, the Stub Hall dormitory sits on a separate lot from the chapel, raising a potential legal question as to whether it qualifies as church grounds.

“The county approached Luther Seminary earlier this year about the possibility of leasing Stub Hall a second time due to the closure of the Government Center East building at 160 E. Kellogg Blvd,” reads the seminary’s announcement. “The city of St. Paul and Ramsey County determined such an emergency overnight shelter was an allowable use for Stub Hall based on federal law pertaining to land owned by religious organizations.”

City officials had said that federal law — the Religious Land Use And Institutionalized Persons Act, or RLUIPA — was on the county’s side, as it awards wide latitude to churches and other religious establishments to operate free from discrimination in zoning and other municipal land-use laws.

In an interview last week, St. Paul Deputy Mayor Jaime Tincher recalled the drawn-out legal battle with the First Lutheran Church in Dayton’s Bluff, which hosted the Listening House day shelter and sued the city to protect the shelter’s right to operate under the conditions, capacity and hours it saw fit. A federal lawsuit ended with a legal settlement in 2019, after some two years of costly court action.

In the case of Luther Seminary, “the city’s position is RLUIPA applies,” Tincher said. “The settlement with First Lutheran provided a lot of direction for the city in how to approach these situations.”

“We’ve been really intentional about figuring out how to provide for that need in a way that is good for our community as a whole,” she added. “We’ve added a lot of (homeless) response teams. We’ve added a lot of staff that has experience in this space, because we want to meet that need in our community in a way that is really responsible.”

‘Tonight we’re going to be open’

It soon became clear the public notification process was coming under as much scrutiny as the shelter itself.

“As a gospel-centered community, we felt this opportunity to meet a need in our region aligned with our values,” said Heidi Droegemueller, vice president for seminary relations, in the announcement. “At the same time, our primary mission is theological education. While we are grateful for the welcome extended by our St. Anthony Park neighbors to shelter residents during the pandemic, it has become clear in recent days that moving forward with Safe Space Shelter is not a constructive path for the seminary or the neighborhood at this time.”

She added, “We remain grateful for the commitment and dedication of Ramsey County’s Department of Housing Instability and Model Cities as they work diligently to solve our community’s housing crisis.”

Downie, the Model Cities CEO, said Monday that Safe Space shelter will continue to operate downtown.

“We’re continuing to operate each night,” she said. “Tonight we’re going to be open. Our staff is going to be there. They’re sad, disappointed … but they’re pretty committed.”

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