A New Home For Little Rock`s Homeless: Touring The Old Dillard`s Headquarters

Construction could begin as early as next month to convert the old Dillard`s headquarters on Capitol Avenue in downtown Little Rock into the Union Rescue Mission. It`s a dream for the people who work with the homeless on a daily basis... The old Dillard`s Headquarters is a huge building. The bottom floor will house the chapel and kitchen. The mission will use the second floor for rehab. The top two floors will be used for storage, for now. News 4 Arkansas Mike Hellgren took a tour for our 10pm newscast on Monday. "They`ll come in. They`ll go down these steps," says shelter director Phil Hill, who created the new layout. It includes a dorm for 130 and a spacious kitchen. Both are more than double the size of the current mission shelter on Magnolia Street in downtown North Little Rock. "This will all be dry storage," Hill said, as he showed Hellgren the kitchen. "There will be a walk-in freezer big enough to hold an 18-wheeler load of food." That`s almost as big as Hill`s dreams for this place, which includes a huge new chapel. "They`ll be double doors here and double doors there, kind of like into a sanctuary," he says. Hill came to the current shelter, homeless himself, 14 years ago. "Fourteen years of dreaming is finally going to come true," he told Hellgren. Soon, his new living quarters will be the old executive office of one of Arkansas` biggest success stories. "I know where my apartment is," he says. Hill`s new walk-in closet--his bathroom--used to belong to Mr. Dillard himself. Down the hall, the rehab center on the second floor is one of the biggest spaces. "You could take that building in North Little Rock and put it in this one section," Hill says. "when you first get here, it`s kind of hard to remember where you`re going, too." You can still see the remnants of Dillard`s. The Mission already donated hundreds of partitions from the old offices. "I get probably 30 questions a day from the guys about it. They`re thrilled," he says. Hill`s thrilled, too. After years of searching, he`s finally found what he feels is the right home to help those who have no home of their own. Hill says the Mission considered using the top two floors to house other charities that help the homeless, but decided against that, so they could keep a tight reign on the people they serve. The homeless themselves will do much of the work to convert this building into a shleter. Right now, there`s no timetable on when it will open. Several business owners spoke against the Union Rescue Mission moving into the Capitol Avenue location. That spurred the Downtown Partnership to develop new guidelines for dealing with the homeless. They`ll present them to the city board tomorrow afternoon, at 4pm, in the second floor board room at city hall. The current Mission space is owned by the city of North Little Rock. Filed by Mike Hellgren