Our journey began when the late Sister Mary O’Donnell along with the St. Mary’s Social Action Committee spearheaded the effort to create a place for people who found themselves homeless. We were then called the Temporary Shelter for the Homeless, Inc. and in 1998 after her death, the name was changed to Sister Mary O’Donnell Emergency Homeless Shelter as a legacy for her selfless service to the people of the community.

We remain the only emergency homeless shelter for the general public in Aroostook County, Maine, geographically the largest County east of the Mississippi and approximately the size of Connecticut and Rhode Island combined, serving a population count of around 72,000 from the 2010 census.