The Salvation Army has taken the next step toward building a proposed community center and homeless shelter in east Lawrence by filing a site plan for review by the Lawrence City Commission.

Neighborhood residents promised Wednesday they would oppose the project.

“We need this new facility, badly,” said Salvation Army administrator Rich Forney. “We cannot rebuild here,” at the church’s downtown location.

Beth Ann Mansur, president of the Brook Creek Neighborhood Assn., promised residents would rally against the plans.

“I’ll pick up petition forms tonight,” she said Wednesday. “The landowners on adjacent properties are willing to sign against this.”

The organization’s plans were announced in October. They call for building along Haskell Avenue, between Lynn and Homewood streets.

The Salvation Army now operates a city-subsidized homeless shelter, which is host to 35 or 40 guests a night, in its downtown headquarters at 946 N.H. But officials say they’ve run out of room at the site.

‘So far out’

At 21,000 square feet for the main church and 13,000 square feet for the shelter, the new center would be twice as large as the current headquarters.

The homeless shelter would include temporary sleeping quarters for families, women and men seeking employment and permanent housing.

The center also would house a food bank and rooms for class work and case-management services, a gymnasium, dining areas and a chapel for the Army’s church services.

Construction of the center would cost $4 million, not including land-acquisition costs, Forney said in October. Fund-raising has not begun.

From the beginning, the Salvation Army’s plans have run into opposition from nearby neighborhoods. Brook Creek and Barker Neighborhood associations both have objected to the plans.

The reasons: fears about homeless residents interacting with children in the neighborhood, declining property values and a sense that the shelter should remain downtown — close to some other homeless services.

“I guess none of us can understand why they’re looking so far out,” Mansur said.

6News video: Salvation Army plans to build new homeless shelter Fraternity roughing it to assist less fortunate (3-30-04) Shelters turn away homeless during subzero temperatures (2-11-04) 6News video: Homeless might get housing Shelters turn away homeless during subzero temperatures (2-11-04) Coordination of efforts sought for homeless (2-4-04) Advocate surveys homeless in Lawrence (2-1-04) See the Journal-World’s Homeless Not Hopeless series (10-03) Salvation Army Lawrence-Douglas County Housing Authority Department of Housing and Urban Development

Concerns, responses

Steve Ozark, president of the Lawrence Coalition on Homeless Concerns, declined to take a position on the subject. His organization is split on the issue, he said.

“Hopefully, it’s going to be a good thing for everybody,” Ozark said.

Forney was skeptical that neighborhood property values would go down, and he noted there were a number of social service agencies, including a Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services office, near the proposed site. But he said his organization could not be responsible for what homeless residents do when they are off the Salvation Army’s campus and in the neighborhood.

That’s true at the downtown location, as well, Forney said.

“When somebody leaves here and yells at a child downtown, we get blamed for it,” he said.

‘Zoning is there’

The new site’s industrial zoning allows for shelter uses, so the Salvation Army filed a site plan with the city. That means the Lawrence City Commission will review the proposal without a recommendation from the Lawrence-Douglas County Planning Commission.

Paul Patterson, a city planner, said the proposal would be reviewed with an eye toward city codes. But because the site’s zoning allows shelter uses, he said, planners can’t make a recommendation on whether a shelter is appropriate for the site.

“It’s not part of what’s being reviewed,” Patterson said. “The zoning is there.”

The Salvation Army already owns the land. Forney said that if approval was received, fund raising and construction could be complete within two years.

The City Commission could review the proposal as soon as mid-May.