New Catholic Charities Center opens on East Broadway in Phoenix Hill neighborhood

The social services arm of the Archdiocese of Louisville has opened a new headquarters on East Broadway that consolidates operations that were spread across the city.

Catholic Charities of Louisville is now chiefly operating out of the Catholic Charities Center at 435 E. Broadway.

Previously, staff worked from a re-purposed convent at 2911 S. Fourth St. on the campus of Holy Name parish and in the former St. Anthony parish campus at 23rd and Market streets.

“The new Catholic Charities Center represents a serious leveling-up in our ability to serve some of the most vulnerable people in our community,” Lisa DeJaco Crutcher, Catholic Charities CEO, said in a statement. “By having so many programs under one roof for the first time, we’ll be able to carry out our mission with more focus, collaboration, and gusto than ever before.”

Catholic Charities of Louisville, founded in 1939, is the social service outreach organization of the Archdiocese of Louisville. It served more than 46,000 individuals last year, according to the nonprofit.

The organization previously planned to build a new headquarters at the Fourth Street site, near Cardinal Stadium and Churchill Downs.

Legal challenges that advanced from Louisville Metro Council to the Kentucky Supreme Court over the demolition of the old Holy Name gym and school at Fourth Street and Haywood Avenue delayed those plans, the Courier Journal previously reported.

While ultimately greenlit to proceed in December 2021 and demolition at the site occurred in February 2022, the organization said it faced elevated building costs of the pandemic era. A project first estimated to cost below $8 million was projected to reach more than $18 million, according to the nonprofit.

“We don’t have $18 million, and if we did, we would not invest it in bricks and mortar,” DeJaco Crutcher previously said in a news release.

The organization changed direction in the summer of 2022, ultimately purchasing the existing building on East Broadway.

The Archdiocese of Louisville bought the 33,500-square-foot building and two associated parking lots for $5.1 million in December 2022 from Stock Yards Bank. The total investment in the new headquarters is $9.2 million.

Located in the Phoenix Hill neighborhood, the new headquarters stands near the nexus of the Smoketown and Old Louisville neighborhoods and the Central Business District.

It’s also close to other service providers including Goodwill, St. Vincent de Paul, Metro United Way, the Franciscan Kitchen, and the Smoketown Family Wellness Center.

The building, known to some as the former AAA Kentucky headquarters, has been converted for multi-purpose use, including offices, communal work areas, child care services as well as meeting and training space.

About 80% of the agency’s 144 employees will work out of the new headquarters. A handful of others will work nearby from a leased space in the MedCenter One building, 501 E. Broadway.

The center offers services for refugees, including classes on English language skills, computer skills, job preparation, cultural orientation, and “family and women empowerment,” the nonprofit said in a release.

Other programming and services are offered for expecting parents, long-term care facility residents, community gardeners, and human trafficking survivors, among others.

A grand opening is set for April 15, with an open house scheduled from 10 a.m. to noon and 2-4 p.m.

While most services are now located on East Broadway, some are located elsewhere. The Sister Visitor Center emergency assistance program at 2235 W. Market St. and Common Table, the culinary arts job training program located in the Dare to Care Community Kitchen at 1200 S. 28th St, will remain at those locations.

The Father Jack Jones Food Pantry will continue to operate from the Holy Name Parish rectory, 2914 S. Third St. Anti-human trafficking work continues, too, at Owensboro and Lexington offices.

Growth & development reporter Matthew Glowicki can be reached at mglowicki@courier-journal.com, 502-582-4000 or on Twitter @mattglo.

This article originally appeared on Louisville Courier Journal: Catholic Charities of Louisville opens new East Broadway headquarters