Here is the press release announcing our acquisition of our new headquarters at 435 E. Broadway.

CATHOLIC CHARITIES OF LOUISVILLE ACQUIRES NEW HEADQUARTERS

The Archdiocese of Louisville announced the purchase of a new headquarters for Catholic Charities of Louisville at 435 E. Broadway. The purchase includes a 75-space surface parking lot at the corner of Gray and Jackson Streets.

Catholic Charities of Louisville purchased the property from Stock Yards Bank for $5.1 million and expects to invest in renovations to convert the workspace to include communal work areas, client meeting rooms, classrooms, and childcare accommodations for clients. The building functioned as an operations center for the bank.

Louisville Archbishop Shelton J. Fabre said he was “very excited” to announce the acquisition of the former Stock Yards Bank property for Catholic Charities of Louisville. “The Catholic Church is one of the largest providers of social services in the United States and around the world, and Catholic Charities of Louisville embodies the social mission of our Archdiocese. I am very proud of all the ways that our Catholic Charities of Louisville serves this community in Louisville as well as communities throughout the 24 counties of the Archdiocese of Louisville.”

Catholic Charities of Louisville Chief Executive Officer Lisa DeJaco Crutcher said she is excited about the location’s centrality to other social service providers like Goodwill, Golden Arrow, and St. Vincent de Paul, its proximity to I-65 and bus routes, and the up-to-date building amenities that will equip her team to best serve its clients.

Stock Yards Bank Chairman and Chief Executive Officer James Hillebrand said his organization is happy to see the building being used to serve others. “Catholic Charities and their clients will benefit from the state-of-the-art technology, outstanding security system, and overall great condition of the building,” he said. “We’re so pleased to facilitate this transition.”

Currently Catholic Charities of Louisville staff are working in a re-purposed convent at 2911 S. Fourth Street, at Holy Name parish, and in the old St. Anthony parish campus at 23^rd and Market Street. The organization will move from both locations to the new building in calendar year 2023.

“We’ve promised our staff this will be their last winter in our current buildings,” DeJaco Crutcher said, noting that today, employees routinely sit at desks wearing winter coats and gloves. “Frankly, our employees deserve better, and we’re thrilled for them to work in a modern space with heat and hot water, reliable internet, and a roof that doesn’t leak.”

DeJaco Crutcher said her organization had been excited to build a new headquarters at its 2911 S. Fourth Street location and take part in revitalizing the area located between Churchill Downs and the University of Louisville. Legal challenges to the demolition of buildings on that site stalled the project until the Kentucky Supreme Court gave the final dismissal in December 2021. However, it became clear that rising costs due to the pandemic had pushed the cost of the new building from below $8 million to over $18 million.

“We don’t have $18 million, and if we did, we would not invest it in bricks and mortar,” DeJaco Crutcher said. The organization began looking for other options in the summer of 2022.

DeJaco Crutcher said the agency will benefit from having most of their team in one building. “We expect that synergy to propel our service to clients,” she said.

About 110 of the agency’s 131 employees will work from the new headquarters at 435 E. Broadway. Staff at Sister Visitor Center, the agency’s outreach at 23^rd and W. Market, will remain in that location. Staff with Common Table, the culinary arts job training program located in the Dare to Care Community Kitchen at 1200 S. 28^th Street, will remain there. But for anti-human trafficking staff based out of Lexington and Owensboro, everyone else will move to the new location.

Client services provided at 435 E. Broadway will include classes for people resettling to Louisville as refugees, such as computer skills, English as a second language, job preparation, family and women empowerment, and cultural orientation.

Catholic Charities of Louisville serves people in need, especially the poor and oppressed. Founded in 1939, the agency is the social services outreach of the Archdiocese of Louisville and serves anyone in need giving no regard to race, religion, creed, color, country of origin, sex, gender, gender identity, ability, or status. Last year the agency served more than 24,000 people.

Its 10 outreach programs include wrap-around services for refugees, the state’s flagship anti-human trafficking initiative, innovative skills training in both culinary arts and language access, advocacy for residents in long-term care facilities like nursing homes, low-cost legal services to immigrants, urban gardening and agribusiness opportunities, direct aid and case management to neighbors in poverty, interpreters and translators in 30-plus languages, support for moms in need, and indigent burial for those who die without resources or family.

DeJaco Crutcher said the agency is “tremendously proud” of the diversity of its workforce, employing practicing Buddhists, Hindus, Muslims, Catholics and other Christians, as well as those of no faith tradition. The staff roster includes individuals born in Africa, Asia, Europe, North America, and South America, including a number who resettled in Louisville as refugees over the past 30 years.

JRA Architects is the architect for the building’s renovations. Wehr Constructors is the construction manager.

Facts and Figures
33,656 square feet0.917 acres at 435 E. Broadway (building) with 39 parking spaces and 0.65 acres (parking) at 501 E. Gray St. with 75 parking spaces
Built in 1965
The building has three finished levels: a lower level, main floor and second floor
The building has one passenger elevator serving all floors and a freight elevator serving the lower and main levels