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Community Corner

Oakdale's Hope Church Concludes Month as Overflow Homeless Shelter

Approximately 136 people, mostly children, stayed at the church over the course of the month.

Oakdale’s had a good problem when it came to staffing its temporary homeless shelter during the month of February—more people willing to volunteer than shifts available, said the volunteer coordinator.

In total about 100 volunteers performed tasks like serving food, staying overnight, or spending an evening talking with parents and playing with kids while a room in the church served as an overflow homeless shelter through Project Home, an effort of the Saint Paul Area Council of Churches, said coordinator Barb Olfelt.

“Our volunteers were very dedicated and faithful,” Olfelt said. “People just stepped up to the plate and went out there with their games and their puppets and their listening ears.”

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About 136 people stayed at the church in the course of the month—most of them kids—Olfelt said. The shelter was only open to families.

Volunteer Cheri Pechmann said she enjoyed playing with the kids, learning the stories of the homeless families and “just realizing that we’re all the same.”

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One woman staying at the shelter, Sylvia Cramer, said she has been looking for somewhere to live since she returned to St. Paul from Idaho in late August. She said she has stayed with her uncle from time to time since she returned, but with as many as 14 people living in the home, she needs somewhere stable “without a lot of drama” for her 1- and 2-year-old girls.

“If I didn’t have my kids right now, I wouldn’t be here, I would be at a friend's house crashing or try to make it work a different way,” she said. “I just need somewhere stable to be.”

Although it’s temporary, for now Project Home has provided that stability, she said.

She said she’s seeking longer-term housing through The Family Place, and hopes to go back to school and get a job, she said.

Project Home sets up overflow shelters in area churches for a month at a time. They provide cardboard partitions to create rooms for each family, air mattresses, toys and many other supplies.

This is the third year Hope Church has participated in Project Home, Olfelt said. The church is helping fill a big need by providing a safe, friendly place for homeless families to stay, she said.

Beyond financial stress, there is a lot of emotional stress in being homeless, she said, and hopefully, for a night, Project Home helps alleviate some of that.

The volunteers get something out of the effort as well, she said.

“I think for me it helps me see … there’s much more out there in the world as far as struggle and strife, than I would ever see within the four walls of my home and even in my life,” she said. “It pretty much has helped me be less selfish with my resources and my time.”

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