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May 9, 2022By Carissa Krautscheid
On May 3, 2022, Catholic Community Services of Southern Arizona (CCS) broke ground on Tucson’s first Medical Respite Center for men and women experiencing homelessness. In attendance were 100 community members including CCS leadership, staff, board members, and many supporters.
Catholic Community Services was founded at the height of the Great Depression in 1933 to help those most in need. CCS staff and supporters have dedicated the past 89 years to strengthening children, adults, families, and communities by providing help, creating hope, and serving all.
“We provide services for almost 80,000 individuals annually,” said CCS Board President Maryann Hockstad, “including Deaf & Residential Services, the Pio Decimo Center for children and families, Casa Alitas for migrant families, St. Jeanne Jugan Ministry with Elders, Kolbe Society for people affected by crime, and our wide variety of services in Yuma, Sierra Vista, and many other communities. We work to create a compassionate and just community that upholds the God-given worth and dignity of every human being. It is powerful work, it is life changing work, and in many cases, it is lifesaving work.”
While the public phase of fundraising for this Medical Respite Center began in 2019, the roots for this initiative began in 2015 with Sister Adele O’Sullivan, CSJ, M.D. As a Sister of Saint Joseph of Carondelet, Sr. Adele is part of a long legacy of meeting the needs of the local community which, in many cases, includes medical services. As a medical doctor, Sr. Adele has served at many medical outreach facilities around Arizona. She is the founder of Circle the City in Phoenix, the first medical respite center in Arizona. Circle the City is a dynamic non-profit and federally qualified community health center that provides high quality, holistic healthcare to people experiencing homelessness in Maricopa County.
“In my own experience in Phoenix,” said Sr. Adele, “the first step toward getting a Respite Center open was not the groundbreaking; it was long before that. It was looking together as a community at what was happening on the streets and allowing it to touch us. It was really seeing the situation and getting to know the people who are suffering and dying on our streets, and hearing their stories. Allowing their indignity, pain, hunger, and lack of basic necessities to touch us. And once the community saw what existed on our streets, allowed it to move us, there was no going back. And I think that is what has happened here in Tucson. You have gone over and through every challenge, toward a compelling vision: a place where wounds of all kinds would heal, as well broken bones and broken spirits. Where all who came would be treated with dignity, given a clean bed and tender care. There would be treatment for diabetes, and multiple other illnesses, maybe even a place for some to die in dignity with care surrounding them. It’s a vision that has tremendous power to pull a community together, and one that will change many lives for the good.”
In 2015, Sister Adele came to Tucson to meet with Bishop Gerald Kicanas “to ask him what the possibilities were for beginning a medical respite program in Tucson. Catholic Community Services brought together a representative cross section of people in the community, healthcare, business, people experiencing homelessness, social service agencies, government officials, health insurance companies, elected officials, and representatives from the University of Arizona and Pima Community College.”
Bishop Edward Weisenburger took up the mission when he became Bishop of the Diocese of Tucson in 2017. “Whenever we look to the interests of our neighbor or the community and serve them,” he said, “we are, in a sense, God’s own co-workers.” Bishop Weisenburger blessed the ground upon which the work at the Medical Respite Center will manifest the commission of the Gospel: “For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, a stranger and you welcomed me, naked and you clothed me, ill and you cared for me, in prison and you visited me” (Matthew 25: 35-36).
While the Groundbreaking is a significant milestone in the formation of Tucson’s own Medical Respite Center, the work is ongoing. CCS hopes to invite the community to the ribbon cutting and grand opening next year. “We still have approximately $3.3M that needs to be raised to complete this $6.8M facility – every gift helps!” said Joseph Leisz, Development Director of CCS. Pledges and contributions can be designated to Medical Respite here: https://www.ccs-soaz.org/donate/form, or call Sandy Erickson at 520-670-0854 or Joe Leisz at 520-670-0809.
“There is a great need for medical respite care for the homeless in Tucson,” said Jean Fedigan, Executive Director of Sister Jose Women’s Center. “Most people leaving the hospital can go home to recuperate, but homeless people can’t do that. They go back to the streets or to a shelter that is not at all set up to care for them. It’s so frustrating for me as a nurse to see these people who are sick go back into a setting where they cannot possibly care for themselves and recover.”
CCS invites us to “imagine recovering from surgery in an alley, recuperating after pneumonia on a dusty sidewalk, or managing medications or a special diet out of an overloaded cart. The result is sick and suffering people on our streets, more vulnerable than ever and in danger of complications that could send them back to the hospital where the cycle could begin again. But it doesn’t have to.”
Tucson’s Medical Respite Center will be a place of healing, love, and hope for up to 48 homeless men and women every day, offering the following accommodations:- Men’s and women’s dormitories
- Meals and special diet accommodations
- Medical care provided by El Rio Health
- Follow-up care and care management
- Recovery and peer support
- Accommodations for patient’s pets
- Day rooms and an interfaith chapel
- Access to housing and social services
It will make a difference. It will save lives.
View Photos Here
Photos by Bob Bingham Photo
View the full program here:
