Catholic Community Services of Utah has new building

Friday, Aug. 29, 2014

SALT LAKE CITY — As the refugee resettlement program kept growing and the organization received more grants, space in the main office of Catholic Community Services of Utah  was getting tighter and tighter, said Danielle Stamos, public relations and marketing coordinator.

“Sometimes we had three or more people working in a small office,” said Stamos.

So, at the beginning of this summer, the administration part of CCS moved to a new facility located at 400 South 230 West in Salt Lake City.

“The administration was together with the refugee resettlement and St. Mary’s [Center for Recovery] at the other location,” said Stamos. “Our refugee foster care program was hosted somewhere else, and when their lease expired we found this new place and we both moved here. It’s actually great because we didn’t take on any financial cost; the rent is so low here that the rent that we get from other spaces covers it.”

The refugee resettlement program is a large part of CCS’ ministry; every year CCS of Utah resettles around 600 to 650 refugees.

“But this year we had really great success in getting grants to hire more people for this program,” said Stamos. 

Utah is one of the five states in the United States that resettles what are called “vulnerable refugees,” “which is mostly single moms with lots of kids, or people with handicaps that can’t work. So, because of that, we have to take in more employees, more case workers, more therapists, to work with these really intense cases,” said Stamos.

The new facility contains only  the administration offices. 

“We don’t do any services here. When people need help they should go to the main location (745 East 300 South, Salt Lake City),” said Stamos.

“Having more space  means that refugee resettlement [workers] have more space and it kind of makes it a better space for the clients to come in. And there are more conference rooms now and they can do their classes there. It seems that it’s really great for all of them,” said Stamos.

CCS of Utah’s resettlement program offers life skills classes, job development and training on how to interview, that includes tips such as what is appropriate to wear in the American work culture. 

“We also have St. Mary’s [Center for Recovery] program with 40 beds, so that is huge for us,” said Stamos. “Having all this space has been great for all of them.”

 

Catholic Community Services of Utah has several facilities that provide programs. Primary locations are:

Main Office: 400 South 230 West, Salt Lake City; 801-977-9119; programs include immigration, refugee resettlement and refugee foster care

St. Vincent de Paul Dining Hall and the Weigand Center: 437 West 200 South, Salt Lake City

Joyce Hansen Hall Food Bank/St. Martha’s Baby Project: 2504 F Avenue, Ogden 

St. Mary’s Center for Recovery: 745 East 300 South, Salt Lake City; 801-977-9119