SOUTH BEND — A site on North Bendix Drive remains the leading potential location for a new homeless shelter after St. Joseph County officials rejected an alternative site proposed by the shelter’s leaders.

Leaders of the New Day Intake Center, a low-barrier shelter that would serve homeless guests whom most other social services providers won’t house, said in a statement late last month that they’d settle for a county-owned site off Old Cleveland Road after land on the 3000 block of North Bendix Drive faced public outcry.

County commissioners reject alternative site

But responding to a Tribune phone call later that same day, commissioner Derek Dieter was blunt about the Old Cleveland Road site, which is just north of the South Bend International Airport: “Absolutely no way will we sell that property there for an intake center.”

He said it’s too close to several nearby residents and it’s in a wooded area, “which is not good for what we deal with, with the homeless.”

Speaking this week, Dieter confirmed that stance. So did county council member Joe Thomas, whom Dieter appointed to lead a task force that aims to propose alternative sites for the intake center.

The Bendix site “is so close to a daycare center, a school, a playground, apartments and subdivisions,” Thomas said. “I’m looking for something that’s not going to be so dramatically affected as that location would be.”

South Bend moving forward with Bendix Drive site

Meanwhile, about a month has passed since the South Bend Redevelopment Commission voted to buy the land on Bendix Drive with tentative plans to sell it for a nominal fee to the New Day nonprofit. The city planned to close on the purchase after a 90-day due diligence period, so the proposed sale to the New Day team won’t occur for months.

Caleb Bauer, South Bend’s executive director of the Department of Community Investment, said at the time he’s confident the site on Bendix could be sold and redeveloped for an industrial use, if it doesn’t become a homeless shelter.

South Bend Mayor James Mueller told The Tribune on Thursday that the Bendix Drive site was chosen after a search that began in 2017, when his predecessor Pete Buttigieg’s task force on chronic homelessness recommended the housing-first approach. Two years later, a plan to build a low-barrier shelter on a vacant lot near Ivy Tech Community College stalled.

During his first term, Mueller advocated for county-owned sites on Old Cleveland Road and near Portage Manor, the former facility for adults with disabilities that county commissioners closed last year. The county said no.

“I didn’t want low-barrier housing” near Portage Manor, Dieter previously told The Tribune. “I want to try to develop that for nicer homes and so on. Out of the gate, before we started looking to close Portage Manor, it was not a good fit.”

Why Ignition Park, closer to downtown aren’t leading options

Business owners opposed to the Bendix Drive site have recommended a 40-acre site in Ignition Park, a city-owned technology park south of Sample Street that’s near the South Bend Police Department and the St. Joseph County Jail. In general, opponents want any homeless shelter to be closer to downtown, where other social services providers are located.

A group of those opponents have scheduled a news conference for Monday morning to continue making their case for Ignition Park and other nearby locations.

Mueller said Ignition Park, which sits on land that was formerly the site of the Studebaker manufacturing facility, is designed for commercial investment. The city spent tens of millions of dollars preparing the site for several businesses that erected new buildings there.

Moreover, in the earliest years of the debate, residents south of downtown expressed dismay that most of the social services were concentrated near them. Mueller continues to believe that’s a valid concern.

“Within the city, we want to make sure there’s a shared responsibility and try to deconcentrate services as much as possible,” Mueller said. “It’s similar to the challenge of wanting to deconcentrate poverty. You don’t want to have pockets of high wealth and poverty in different areas. Those problems compound upon themselves when you have concentrations of issues.”

The Department of Housing and Urban Development has supported mixed-income residential development for decades, responding to studies showing that concentrated poverty leads to increased crime and poor health outcomes while reducing private investment.

New Day Intake Center leaders see need to move quickly

New Day leaders face time constraints and reject the argument from Thomas and county leaders that the search process was rushed.

Margie Pfeil, the nonprofit board’s president, said she’s toured several county-owned sites with Dieter over the past two years, including the Old Cleveland Road parcel. The city stepped in to identify other possible sites and landed on the North Bendix Drive location, which it bought from the South Bend Community School Corp.

The New Day center has received $5 million in grants from Indiana’s Department of Mental Health and Addictions, Pfeil said, and that money must be used by the end of 2025.

Leaders are working to fundraise for much of the remaining cost of the anticipated $12-16 million facility, with some support expected from the city of South Bend. Mueller said early estimates suggest the city could spend $500,000 a year on the center’s operations. County leaders haven’t pledged any money to help.

“We have been planning this for awhile, discussing designs and preparing,” Pfeil said. “From our perspective, it’s time to move forward.”

How the housing-first model serves homeless guests

The New Day center’s housing-first approach is backed by nationwide evidence and numbers shared by Motels4Now, a low-barrier shelter that started in August 2020 and has modeled how the intake center would run. Both programs operate under the Catholic homeless services provider Our Lady of the Road.

The center’s low-barrier model would eschew rules requiring sobriety, income or substance abuse treatment in order to house people who can’t live anywhere else. With stable housing, people can then choose to receive medical treatment on site and work with staff to apply for permanent housing.

Program leaders say Motels4Now has helped more than 700 guests, and 78% of them have found success at the motel or moved on willingly to a better option. Of more than 200 people placed in permanent housing, three quarters remain stably housed, leaders said.

“Wherever the New Day Intake Center is located,” the nonprofit’s board said in a statement, “we are committed to working closely with neighbors to benefit the common good of the whole community.”

Email South Bend Tribune city reporter Jordan Smith at JTsmith@gannett.com. Follow him on X: @jordantsmith09

This article originally appeared on South Bend Tribune: Latest on plans for a low-barrier homeless shelter in South Bend