St. Thomas began razing five buildings along Grand Avenue, including four houses and an office building, on Aug. 15.
The buildings previously housed the Christian-Muslim Dialogue Center, Jay Phillips Center for Interfaith Learning, Parking Services and rental housing at 2093, 2097, 2103, 2167 and 2117-2119 Grand Ave. According to Doug Hennes, vice president for university and government relations, St. Thomas decided to tear them down largely due to their deteriorating conditions.
The university plans on using the space to create more student housing, but for now the area will be landscaped and used as green space.
Kjestina Bruer, a resident in an apartment near the razed buildings, is excited about the possibility of seeing green.
“Living in the city makes it rare to see green grass or lawns of any kind, so I think that these green spaces will add a lot to the area,” Bruer said. “The possibility of having a yard nearby is kind of exciting, especially when living in an apartment.”
Parking Services will be relocated to Murray-Herrick Campus Center, and the Christian-Muslim Dialogue Center and the Jay Phillips Center for Interfaith Learning will both move into a St. Thomas-owned house at 2057 Portland Ave. The building will be renamed “Centers for Interreligious Understanding” to reflect this new collaboration.
Hans Gustafson, associate director of the Jay Phillips Center for Interfaith Learning, is looking forward to sharing a closer partnership with the Christian-Muslim Dialogue Center.
Though the two centers are not officially affiliated, they have shared an intimate and collaborative relationship over the past several years,” Gustafson said. “Co-locating the two centers will only help to enhance their collaborative potential.”
The two centers received a $10,000 grant this summer from the Interfaith Youth Core, a non-profit organization working to make interfaith cooperation a social norm. This will aid in developing an interreligious studies program at St. Thomas, and their new building will be a big help in getting the program off the ground.
“This coming year will be the implementation phase of that grant, and the new building will help to fulfill some of the programmatic needs of the grant,” Gustafson said. “The space is much larger, nicer, and offers many different rooms that will enhance the variety of programming possible.”
Ultimately, he wants to reach as many students and faculty as possible.
“We are mostly excited to make the building accessible to the UST community and assist them with realizing any initiatives they might envision that fosters interreligious understanding and interfaith learning,” Gustafson said.
Mary Brickner can be reached at bric0029@stthomas.edu