Homeless Shelter History
A casual conversation at the Blackstone restaurant in the summer of 2005 gave no indication of the chain of events to follow. Members of the Streetlights Outreach team were having lunch with the new priest for Saint John the Evangelist church, Fr. Guy Blair. Their ministry had brought them into contact, time and again, with people from Green Bay who literally had nowhere to stay; sleeping outside, always tired, never feeling safe. Of all the churches they knew, St. John's had the largest available space: the gymnasium of the attached school. Could that be used to shelter the homeless? Would there be room at the inn?Whatever their expectations, they could not have hoped for a more positive response from Fr. Blair: "How soon can we get it running?" The Brown County Homeless & Housing Coalition, the largest private organization of local service providers, had long recognized that some people were falling through the cracks. Clients who were not connecting with, or not quite meeting the requirements for the services they needed.
A low-entry-threshold shelter would keep them safe through the winter while they worked on long-term solutions. Bringing together Fr. Blair, the BC-HHC, and initial funding from The Next Step Social Justice Center to hire full-time, professional staff, the BC-COTS (Brown County - Churches Offering Temporary Shelter) program was created and able to open its doors before the first snow fall. With the ongoing support of BC-HHC's service providers, many individual donors, and several local faith communities, Saint John the Evangelist church remained home to the BC-COTS program during the winters of 2005/2006 and 2006/2007. Successfully sheltering hundreds of people, during the coldest parts of the year, who would not have been eligible to stay at any of the permanent homeless shelters in the area. In the fall of 2007, the program was reorganized under the direction of the Green Bay Catholic Diocese, changing the name from BC-COTS to St. John the Evangelist Homeless Shelter, but continuing the same mission of providing shelter to our most vulnerable citizens under the most inhospitable conditions. While occasional minor adjustments to the schedule have been made in response to the weather, our season is usually from the beginning of November through mid-to-late April.
As a temporary, emergency shelter, St. John operates a maximum of 180 days per year.
Archive of public documents in Adobe Acrobat PDF format:
January 22, 2006 • COTS provides important, possibly lifesaving service, column by Lou O'MalleyAugust 31, 2007 • Bridging the Gap by Bishop David Zubik - A scraped knee and beyond
October 14, 2007 • Concern for homeless has personal roots, column by Fr. Blair
November 2, 2007 • Archbishop Dolan's Letter to Green Bay's Mayor Schmidt
November 4, 2007 • editorial in Green Bay Press-Gazette regarding Archbishop Dolan's letter.
November 16, 2007 • Green Bay City Council gives approval to shelter
December 14, 2007 • The Compass, Volunteers step forward to assist at homeless shelter
December 30, 2007 • Rev. Guy Blair is Person of the Year
March 3, 2008 • Dcn. Reilly's Remarks to the media regarding St. John the Evangelist Homeless Shelter
March 25, 2008 • opinion from Green Bay City legal department regarding constitutional rights of religiously affiliated homeless shelters.
July 29, 2008 • article on Diocesan website about the Year-end-report from Executive Director Mary Marks.
March 23, 2009 • Need for shelter renovations is announced.