The Rapid City Hope Center is officially dissolving after two years without a physical home.
In a community with a significant unhoused population, it marks one fewer resource to turn to during cold winter months.
The daytime mission center stopped serving unhoused community members in December of 2023. At the time it served up to 300 unhoused individuals daily.
In a social media post, the organization said since then it sought to find and open a new location. But that search was unsuccessful, and now the board is dissolving.
Representatives from Hope Center could not be reached for comment on the dissolution. But in a 2023 interview with SDPB, executive director Melanie Timm said it’s a serious loss for Rapid City.
"I don’t know where people are going to go. I hate saying that," Timm said. "But that’s the reality. I don’t know where people are going to go. No one does exactly what we do.”
Timm explained precisely what this means for the Hope Center’s clientele.
“The room was silent," Timm said. "He burst into tears and he said, ‘You mean our family is breaking up?’ I tried to assure him that we’d do everything that we could to stay connected to him.”
The financial struggles for the organization began with the rent on their former facility doubling. Those struggles were then compounded by the Rapid City Council denying a permit to move the Hope Center into a larger, already purchased facility.
Lorien Peterson was president of the Hope Center board. In 2023, she said city leadership put significant hurdles in the way.
“We’ve also been told often we’re not desired to be in the downtown area," Peterson said. "Without being able to be close to downtown—or near residential—that kind of limits where we can go.”
This despite the fact most of the population in need of the Hope Center’s services spend their time in the downtown neighborhood.
In the social media post announcing the dissolution, leadership writes they intend to donate their remaining funds to four other local organizations doing similar work.