ot the frozen cold weather, not the legions of pigeons under the roof, not even the cartons of paperwork could keep Portland West’s Clerk of the Works, Larry Davis, from getting started on the St. Dominic’s Girls School project in Winter of 2003. Now with all the apartments rented and occupied, the transformation is now complete!

Until 2003, St. Dominic’s Roman Catholic Church and its Girls School at State and Gray Streets already had been empty for four years, abandoned by the dynamics of a shrinking congregation and a million dollar repair bill. The City of Portland bought the church property in 2001 for $50,000. In 2002, it chose Portland West and PROP to purchase the Girls School. On New Year’s Day, 2003, we celebrated the closing of the purchase and beginning of its renovation.

Youth Building Alternatives, the Portland West alternative education program, was assigned to transform an area on the second floor into a two-bedroom apartment. They began work in the unheated building in March 2003 warmed by their enthusiasm. When the students were not doing academics in their classroom, they were on site, applying their construction and renovation learning to St. Dominic’s.

This renovation project is bound up in 165 years of Irish immigrant family history in Portland and 35 years of affordable housing history at Portland West. It is about new beginnings and more new beginnings. PROP, the Irish Heritage Center, and Portland West collaborated to create a vision to preserve and honor the years of history at St. Dominic’s. We came up with an innovative plan to turn the school into affordable housing while maintaining the building’s historical integrity. The Irish Heritage Center is already working on its project to turn the gothic revival structure that is the sanctuary into a genealogical research center, a theatre and a community space to accommodate 300 people. New lights will come on in an old community when the project is finally completed.

Meanwhile, general contractor CCB, Inc. and sub-contractors are at work. TFH Architects, John DeStefano and Associates, People’s Heritage Bank, the Maine Historic Preservation Commission, the Maine State Housing Authority, and the City of Portland all joined hands to play their parts in making the St. Dominic’s project happen.