Citing a budget crisis, a nonprofit day center for homeless parents and their children has officially stopped providing services at First Baptist Church in downtown St. Paul.

The departure of Family Place after more than a decade of serving vulnerable St. Paul-area families has a silver lining, at least for now. Through a 3 1/2-month contract with Ramsey County, Interfaith Action of Greater St. Paul’s Project Home has taken over operations of the same facility.

Project Home, which for nearly 30 years has housed parents and kids in 24 houses of worship overnight, began offering day services at the former site of Family Place over the weekend. Families can spend their days at the facility from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. to shower, enjoy a hot meal or meet with a social worker.

“We signed a contract on Friday and they were ready to go Sunday,” said Ramsey County Board Chair Jim McDonough. “That will give us 3 1/2 months to work with a number of community partners … to figure (this) out. I give a lot of credit to the Ramsey County staff that worked on this, and to the Interfaith Action Council.”

Randi Roth, executive director of Interfaith Action, said Tuesday that the beginning of the school year presented a tight timing deadline because school buses do their pick-ups at Family Place.

Roth called Family Place’s closure an “organizational crisis” for Project Home because many of the families that use their overnight services are transported to Family Place around 6 a.m. every school day.

“We just needed to get the kids to school the day after Labor Day,” Roth said. “And then let’s figure out how we’re going to do this long-term. What is the solution going to be? But we wanted to be sure the families had someplace to go (this) morning.”

She called the transition from one service provider to another “seamless.”

“Right now we’re just calling it the day center,” Roth said. “We had just a few days to do everything, to negotiate a contract with Ramsey County, to hire staff, to figure out food. We hadn’t even named it yet.”

BUDGET CRISIS FOR FAMILY PLACE

Margaret Lovejoy, the founding director of Family Place, announced in early August that her funding had all but run dry after 14 years and she would likely close the nonprofit’s doors at the end of August. That set off a mad dash within Ramsey County offices to figure out an alternative.

Lovejoy could not be reached for comment on Tuesday, and the Family Place website indicates that it has stopped providing services and that all questions should be directed to Interfaith Action of Greater St. Paul.

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Roth said Project Home has operated overnight services for 28 years, but a day program with targeted services for the homeless will have to evolve as funding is sorted out.

“We’re able to add a social worker … and work with them on finding stable housing and all other kinds of needs,” Roth said. “But the day center closing was an organizational crisis for us because it doesn’t work to just provide shelter at night. The families need supports during the day as well.”