The Salvation Army wants to tweak the location of its proposed new downtown Peoria men's shelter, so the current shelter can remain open while construction is ongoing.
Craig Young with the Salvation Army told the Peoria Planning and Zoning Commission on Thursday that the original plan to build a new one-story men's shelter on the site of the former Peoria Labor Temple would have meant an 18-month long lapse in services for that unhoused population.
"And not only can the city not afford that, but the Salvation Army can't afford that, because that would have extended over two grant cycles for the program, and we might have actually lost the program," he said.
Young said building a new two-story shelter on the corner of NE Jefferson Ave. and Bryan St. reduces the overall building footprint, from 15,140 square feet to 10,631 square feet. That allows the current shelter to stay open in the interim.
"We also increase capacity a little bit with this two story design compared to what our old plan that we brought to you is going to be," he said. "We will be increasing capacity from 45, at which we are maxed out every night, to 72. So there'll be 32 more beds for those homeless men who are on the streets right now."
He said the changed design will also put the main entrances to the men's and family shelters on Bryan instead of Jefferson, which is more public facing for the traffic entering downtown Peoria.
Young said the old Labor Temple building will still come down this year, but it'll instead become "very attractive green space in the interim," with fencing surrounding it.
He said a large bronze plaque commemorating Peoria laborers killed while serving in the armed forces during World War II will be removed intact by the contractors demolishing the building.
"We've actually started conversations with labor about how best to memorialize that with them," Young said. "We've considered things like a plaque on that site, on the green space that will be there, but we're going to be wide open to conversations with labor to appropriately preserve that."
The modifications to the site plan were approved by the Planning and Zoning Commission and go before the Peoria City Council for a vote on Oct. 22.