MADISON — With a blessing and a ceremonial groundbreaking, the Lumen House student housing project is underway in downtown Madison.
The project will allow Catholic students actively involved in the ministries of St. Paul’s University Catholic Center or the Cathedral Parish to pay rent at a reduced rate. It will also offer financial aid for those students in need. The programs supported by the rents from the building and the contributed services of the residents will benefit many students at the University of Wisconsin and people in the local community.
Lumen House will be located on the Holy Redeemer school site, on W. Johnson St. in Madison, which will go through an historic renovation for adaptive reuse.
Students from St. Paul’s were on hand for the recent groundbreaking, as well as volunteers from around the Diocese of Madison and officials from Landgraf Construction, who will be working on the project.
Blessing of the site
Prior to the blessing, Msgr. Kevin Holmes, pastor of the Cathedral Parish called the project an “asset for the life of the Church.”
Bishop Robert C. Morlino, Bishop of Madison, said Lumen House is “an opportunity to live together in community in Christ.”
Most of the finished project will be in the former Holy Redeemer school building. There will be some additions to the back of the building for another entrance, as well as a lobby and elevators.
(Catholic Herald photo/Kevin Wondrash)
The finished project will have four floors, as the top floor will be remodeled into two separate floors.
Some deconstruction of the building had already begun prior to the groundbreaking.
Project background
As part of a revitalization of its campus ministry — and after repeated requests by Catholic students and parents statewide for a faith-based residence as an alternative housing option at UW-Madison — St. Paul’s began planning for such housing and for an expansion of faith-based services.
More than three years ago, St. Paul’s sought City of Madison approval to build residential accommodations as part of its planned new facility on the State Street Mall. In January 2011, approval to construct the new building as planned was denied on account of its height, despite very favorable comments from city staff and Catholic students in support of the project.
Earlier this year, the Cathedral Parish identified the former Holy Redeemer School as an alternative site for faith-based student housing and more campus outreach. That building had been only marginally maintained since it closed as a parochial school in 1965.
Currently, a chain-link fence surrounds the building, next to Holy Redeemer Church, as work gets underway.
Housing is expected to be available to students by the fall of 2014.