BY CLAIRE O’CALLAHAN
THE BERKSHIRE EAGLE
TUESDAY, JUNE 10, 2025
PITTSFIELD — When people walk through the doors of the housing resource center at Zion Lutheran Church, they won’t be asked to identify themselves as homeless or be required to seek support services.
“If you have been out all night walking the streets of Pittsfield, you may want to sit in a comfortable chair and rest for a bit,” said Eileen Peltier. “That is perfectly welcome.”
Those kinds of spaces — where people can set down their belongings, charge their phones, wash their clothes and take a shower — are few and far between in the city. Even as housing costs rise and more people find themselves experiencing homelessness and housing instability, public restroom access in Pittsfield has remained limited and there are no public showers or spaces for people to safely store their belongings.
The housing resource center, which will be called The First, is a strong step forward in bridging that gap. Once construction wraps up in September, the center will offer publicly accessible restrooms, showers, laundry machines, lockers and a commercial kitchen, among other resources.
“The vision is less to be a clinical, bureaucratic-heavy place where cases are managed, and more a place where community is built,” said Joel Bergeland, pastor at Zion Lutheran Church. “We know that these are not cases we are talking about, these are people.”
To do that, the team of community partners behind the center have decided to fundraise to cover annual staffing and supply costs for at least the first few years. That will free the center from the strings that often accompany state and federal funding, Peltier said. By September, the team hopes to raise $600,000 from local foundations, organizations and individuals to cover the first two years of operational costs.
HOW IT ALL BEGAN
“This story starts in the spring of 2021 when both Eileen and myself moved here to the Berkshires and began our roles that we are still in,” Bergeland said. “I stepped into a church with a big heart full of what you might call faith — that our actions needed to align with our values.”
He also stepped into a church where two floors were completely unusable to the congregation.
A few years before, the congregation had renovated the church’s sanctuary to create a more functional space. The renovation triggered an expensive state regulation, and effectively closed the basement and second floor of the church to public use.
As costs began stacking up and the congregation faced paying for a new roof, Bergeland started cold calling local organizations to ask whether they could use the space. One of the people who picked up the phone was Peltier, who is the CEO of Hearthway, a local housing and homelessness agency.
After years of planning, construction finally began late last year on the housing resource center, located in the basement of the church, and nine permanent supportive housing apartments on the second floor. Those projects are slated for completion in September.
A LIVING ROOM
Peltier said she has dreamed of creating a project like the housing resource center for years.
“Having worked my entire career on issues related to social justice, I have observed as humans, we tend to judge from afar,” Peltier said. “But when we share and create relationships, the judgment falls away and compassion and caring is centered.”
Together with representatives from ServiceNet and Church of the Beloved, along with homeless people themselves, Peltier and Bergeland settled on using the living room model at the housing resource center.
The idea is essentially this — a drop-in center with a large shared space, where people can escape the elements and build community, paired with essential resources like restrooms, showers and voluntary support services.
“This is not come in and we will tell you how to fix your life and give you 57 forms to fill out. If that’s what you want, we can connect you there or we can connect you to the Housing Consumer Education Center at Hearthway,” Peltier said. “There is not an expectation that you must do certain things.”
Peltier and representatives from ServiceNet, who will run the center, said The First’s future will, in large part, be decided by the people who come through its doors.
“We’re essentially meeting people where they’re at and taking the lead from the individuals who will be accessing the space,” Peltier said. “Our goal is to create an advisory body of individuals who will be using the space to help guide us.”
NO STRINGS ATTACHED
To run the center in the way they believe will be most effective, Peltier and her team decided to fundraise the money needed to cover staffing and supply costs.
“We felt this was important in the first few years to build trust. Once we are established and have a good reputation in the community, we might consider funding that has strings,” Peltier said.
Taking funding from the state or federal government would require them to collect demographics about the people they serve. Peltier said she and ServiceNet agreed they don’t want to ask those questions until they build strong connections with the community.
The construction costs and 10-year lease is covered by $4,670,000 in American Rescue Plan Act funds the city dedicated to the project under former Mayor Linda Tyer.
Fundraising to cover the remaining operating costs has already begun. One local organization, which has yet to publicly reveal its name, has pledged a generous leading partnership, said Amy Diehl, director of communication and development for ServiceNet.
Soon there will also be flyers with barcodes posted around downtown requesting donations, Peltier said. She encouraged individuals to contribute if they are able, and said there will also be volunteer opportunities at the center later this year.
“We all drive by individuals who are struggling regularly or interact with individuals in Pittsfield,” Peltier said. “This would be an opportunity to make a contribution and a donation to a program that we know is impactful in helping.”
