The Ohio County Baptist Association building on Center Street in Hartford. The Baptist Association had agreed to rent the building as a homeless shelter for $1 per month if the Joint Board of Adjustments had allow for a Conditional Use permit to be issued for the shelter's operation in a business district.[/caption]
Emotions, concerns and a battery of questions filled a two-hour night, as members of the public and Joint Board of Adjustments (JBOA) converged at a Beaver Dam/Hartford Planning and Zoning public hearing on Nov. 13 at the Beaver Dam City Building. The purpose of the meeting was to discuss the possibility of granting a Conditional Use permit to a proposed homeless shelter site.
Members from the JBOA opened the hearing around 6:05 p.m. to discuss and gain feedback from the public on whether to vote for or against granting a Conditional Use permit to The Promise Home, Inc. The Promise Home, Inc. is a nonprofit organization formed to provide the displaced residents of Ohio County a homeless shelter.
The organization wanted to rent the Ohio County Baptist Association building on 127 E. Center Street in Hartford, and make it the Promise Home shelter. The purpose of the Conditional Use permit was to allow the nonprofit organization to use the building as a shelter for the homeless and those in need as the building is in an area zoned as a business district.
Only Chairperson Nick White and member Dannie Overton were present at the beginning of the meeting, and at least three of the five board members needed to be present in the beginning for a majority to be counted. Secretary Vince Tanner and member Larry Smith arrived later in the meeting, while Vice Chairperson Patsy Vance was absent.
Angela Porter-Stewart, the vice chair of The Promise Home, Inc., made her opening statement saying the organization wanted to serve up to 40 people in the shelter, but would take it slow in the beginning. And when it came to supporting such a venture, she said Ohio County Judge-Executive David Johnston and the fiscal court were behind the project.
“In the (Oct. 28 fiscal court) meeting, the magistrates allotted some of their discretionary funds to assist with this,” she said.
During the public comments, many concerns were expressed about the possible adverse effects that would come to the area if such a shelter was built. The chief concerns included a lack of parking space and privacy, decrease in public safety and property value and stifling of business growth.
The JBOA also had a number of questions, such as, what would be involved in an applicant’s background check and who would run them? Are there experienced managers that have a background in managing homeless shelters within the organization’s current group and who will be the sole responsible member of the shelter when it opens?
After a little over an hour into the hearing, the mounting concerns and questions from both sides began to weigh heavily on Porter-Stewart. As she was explaining how the Baptist Association was going to charge her organization a dollar a month for rent, she talked about her work sheltering homeless children, and her voice began to waver.
“[The rent] is a dollar a month, and to get these children that I’ve been working with over the past year under a roof, out of this cold, [and] in the rain, I’m going to do it. And I’m going to fight to do it! We gotta have this whether it’s here or somewhere else. I don’t have any more tents to give out,” Porter-Stewart said as she shed a couple of tears.
While many of the participants recognized the need for a homeless shelter and commended Porter-Stewart on her work with the project, the general feeling was the Baptist Association building may not have been the best proposed site, due to the number of adverse effects that it could bring to the area.
On Nov. 17, White sent a document to the Ohio County Monitor which stated the JBOA declined The Promise Home, Inc., a Conditional Use permit for the Baptist Association building. According to White, before making their decision, the JBOA took into consideration the organization’s permit request, its business plan, Porter-Stewart’s testimony, and project sponsors, as well as comments made by property owners, area residents, and community leaders.
The reason for the denial was the board “found the character, nature and requirements of a multi-family like, medium-term, transitional residence for the homeless was incompatible with the character and nature of the high density, B-1 zoned, Central Business District,” as defined by the Zoning Ordinance and the Comprehensive Plan’s developmental goals and objectives.
Even though the JBOA denied the nonprofit organization the Conditional Use permit, they noted in the document, they too recognize a need for such an establishment and listed a couple of suggestions to help reduce Ohio County’s homeless situation.
The first was for the Hartford and Beaver Dam city governments, the Ohio County Emergency Management team, local churches and charitable organizations, to provide immediate temporary emergency shelters for Ohio County’s homeless during the unseasonably cold weather. The second was to set up a working committee to help The Promise Home, Inc., and other charitable organizations, build a practical homeless and transitional shelter for Ohio County.
After the board's decision, Porter-Stewart was still incredibly hurt by the entire process. She said during the meeting, she felt like she was on trial for murder.
“That was very brutal, very cold, I felt like,” she said.
When Porter-Stewart first learned about the JBOA’s decision to deny The Promise Home the Conditional Use permit, she cried.
“I bawled like a baby. Then, I just got my composure and just told God to lead me to where I’m supposed to go,” she said.
However, Porter-Stewart said it was the JBOA’s right to hold an opposing side and she respects them for it. She believes they did their job very well and commends them for it. She also believes the meeting may have not been for acquiring the building, but for another reason.
“It may be just to open some people’s eyes and just get the word out a little more about the homeless situation that we do have here in the county, and all I can do is pray about it and pray that God will show us where we need to go,” she said.
This bump in the road isn’t stopping her from helping the homeless. She will now be looking into other potential pieces of property for the shelter, while crunching the numbers along the way to see where the organization can go from here.
To view a PDF of the JBOA's ruling, click here.