For more than a quarter-century, Mother Mary Jennifer Carroll has been healing human spirits, teaching New Britain’s young minds and ministering to the sick and elderly.
But for the last two of those years, she’s donned a hard hat to oversee a $14 million renovation of her 88,000-square-foot former convent into low-income senior housing units and a child-care facility.
Funded with a combination of federal Housing and Urban Development, state, and city grants, and private donations, the transformation of the Daughters of Mary of Immaculate Conception’s Mother House will continue the order’s ministry in the city, which began in 1904 caring for the poor and vulnerable.
“It’s been an amazing experience. I never imagined I’d learn terms like ‘roughing-in’,” said Mother Jennifer, the superior general of the order. “Growing up I wanted to be a fireman but they told me girls can’t do that, so I settled for a grade-school teacher.”
The renovation known as Marian Heights is set to open in July. It is an example of a growing number of religious orders transforming their properties into HUD-sponsored housing that serve the community. Similar projects have been completed at convents throughout the country.
HUD spokesman Brian Sullivan said funding fluctuate each year, but a significant number of HUD’s affordable senior housing grants are awarded to faith-based organizations like the Daughters of Mary of Immaculate Conception.
“We are seeing a large number of religious communities involved in supportive housing projects for the elderly,” said Sullivan.
In 2005, the year the New Britain order applied for a HUD supportive senior housing grant, almost half of HUD’s grants — 55 of 130 — went to faith-based organizations, he said.
What sets Marian Heights apart is that the sisters will continue to live in their convent, while sharing it with the community, said Greg Zorzi, an architect and president of Studio One Inc, the project’s Massachusetts designer.
“The sisters aren’t building a retirement home for themselves,” said Zorzi, whose firm also designed the conversion of the Sisters of Saint Joseph of Springfield’s convent into affordable housing.
In New Britain, the sisters will occupy the fourth floor of the former convent, sharing the rest of the building with seniors who will live in 42 one-bedroom units. To qualify, single residents cannot earn more than $29,800 a year, or $34,050 for a couple.
The sisters won’t make money as landlords. They turned their property over to a nonprofit corporation and partnered with tax-exempt Elderly Housing Management Inc. in Hamden to manage Marian Heights. EHM manages more than 50 affordable senior and housing communities in Connecticut and Massachusetts.
Marian’s rents will range from $25 to $598 a month, depending on a resident’s income and expenses, said EHM’s property management director Tammy Lautz.
“We still get to enjoy our grounds and building, yet others will have the same wonderful feeling,” said Mother Jennifer, 64.
The conversion of the convent began a decade ago as the number of sisters living there dwindled from almost 200 in its heyday to 12. A school the order once ran on the 147-acre wooded property closed long ago.
“We looked at the house and the beautiful grounds and asked ourselves if there was something we could do for the community,” said Mother Jennifer.
After meeting with city officials, they decided on a home for the elderly because the sisters currently run the St. Lucian’s Home for the Aged in New Britain and the Monsignor Bojnowski Manor, a skilled nursing facility.
They say they rejected millions of dollars from commercial developers to turn the property into office space or market rent apartments.
“I had two different real estate agents call me a fool. Our purpose isn’t to make money. It’s to serve people, not Realtors,” said Mother Jennifer.
In 2005, they secured a $6.2 million HUD grant, $2.2 million from the state, $100,000 from New Britain’s Home program, and more than $4 million in private funds.
Putnam contractor Barr Inc. won the construction bid. John Darigan, Barr’s vice president, said knocking down walls and installing code-required fire and sprinkler alarm systems, and modernizing the heating and air conditioning system in a century- old building was challenging.
The four-story brick building was built in phases from 1937 to 1960, using a variety of construction materials. Among the challenges Darigan faced was preserving the building’s architectural details, including the chapel’s stained- glass windows and curved plaster ceilings, and dealing with a bomb shelter on the property.
“Anytime you work on a 100-year-old building there are a lot of unknowns, but you attack the challenges and create solutions,” said Darigan, whose company renovated Birchwood Terrace, a low-income elderly housing project in Danielson.
Mother Jennifer said she’ll never forget her two years overseeing the project, which included countless trips to a Lowe’s home improvement store, and lessons in heating and air conditioning options, windows, and carpet and tile choices.
“I learned to ask a lot of questions and be open to suggestions,’’ she said. “And that the paint samples they give you at the store never match the true color.’’
