CCP 03062023 - Laserfiche WebLink

Home

ATTACHMENT F An Annotated History of the Prince of Peace Interim Sacred Settlement 1 Prior Care Offered to Our Neighbors Prince of Peace has been serving the community of Roseville since its founding in 1957. The pastors and staff are charged by the congregation to offer assistance whenever someone presents themselves at our doorstep seeking help. These requests and our responses take many forms, and we see this work as an act of faith, living out our callings to do God’s work with our hands. April 1, 2016 I began serving Prince of Peace as its Lead Pastor. There were several active PoP ministries already serving our community at this time. The church property includes six large garden plots that are provided to Karen families who live nearby. In partnership with Every Meal, we provide weekend food support to students and families at Central Park Elementary School. We provide this school’s social worker with gift cards and respond to specific requests for assistance. We have stockeda resource closet at Roseville Area Middle School with food and supplies. 2018 & 2019 Pastoral staff participated in community conversations hosted by ISD 623 in which they described that up to 275 students enrolled in Roseville schools were unstably housed. At the direction of the Congregation Council, we formed an Affordable Housing Team to consider how the church might respond to this unsettling reality for our neighbors. 2020-present While our Affordable Housing Team began its investigations, we also experienced a significant rise in the day-to-day requests for assistance walking through the door. Also increasing was our recognition that our parking lot was hosting multiple vehicles overnight. These guests rarely sought additional assistance. In June of 2022, there one couple that we discovered one morning who had set up a tent on the south property and I invited them to stay as long as they needed. Mid-late July 2022 Cari McCollor of Roseville Police Department called me and asked if we could host Valerie Roy’s licensed RV on our parking lot. As is my discretion to assist those who come to the church seeking assistance, I was quick to accept the request of the city and make arrangements for Valerie to locate her RV at the west end of the parking lot. Valerie arrived on our property, and we oriented her to the campus. About one week later, the RV was relocated to an old patch of pavement on the south property, just opposite the community gardens. It was about this time that Valerie introduced me to Gabrielle Clowdus & Anne Franz, co-founders of Settled. They had stopped by to check-in on Valerie, see her new home location, and transport her to the Settled workshop for a scheduled activity. This initial conversation opened the door to become more aware of what Settled was doing in St. Paul and the Mosaic Christian Community on Wheelock Parkway.