Amid a slew of Springfield projects awarded funding in the Missouri budget, Victory Mission and Ministry is set to receive $11 million for the construction of a new 160-bed men’s shelter in north Springfield.
Jason Hynson, executive director of Victory Mission, said the project will be located directly north of the organization's men’s shelter at 1610 N. Broadway Ave., which will be torn down following the construction of the new building. The new facility will be designed to accommodate emergency, transitional and long-term needs on the first floor, with offices on the second floor.
“The building we're currently in was really a nursing home… so that kind of has one function, and we've been able to kind of section off different areas, but each of those populations we have have different needs,” Hynson said.
The second floor offices will allow Victory Mission to relocate administrative operations from its facility at 1715 N. Boonville Ave., which would likely be remodeled to accommodate women’s programs.
“There's a lot of needs in our community,” Hynson said. “And we want to be able to try to better resource those, and you’ve got to have facilities to do that in.”
In addition to providing shelter space for people coming from homelessness, incarceration and poverty, Victory Mission operates a food pantry, a discipleship program and its WorkReady BootCamp.
State dollars could accelerate private fundraising
Though the shelter will be divided between emergency needs, transitional housing and long-term recovery, Hynson said the staff at Victory Mission is designing and zoning the building to be a flexible space.
“The building will be able to breathe a little bit,” Hynson said.
Hynson credited state representatives Alex Riley and Cody Smith, state senators Lincoln Hough and Curtis Trent and Gov. Mike Parson for shepherding the funding into the state government budget.
The appropriation will be combined with private funding to finance the project, which Hynson said is estimated to cost as much as $22 million. Hynson said Victory Mission has raised about $500,000 in seed funds, and that the $11 million allocation could help accelerate fundraising efforts.
“Without a significant gift like this, it’s pretty hard to raise money these days,” Hynson said. “There’s just a lot of great projects in Springfield, so this helps us kind of move quickly to some legitimacy.”
Hynson said a lot of details still needed to be worked out, and was uncertain on when Victory Mission would break ground on the project, but indicated that they may be able to get started before the full $22 million is raised.
