Mennonite Weekly Review

ELKHART, Ind. — The 83-year-old hotel in downtown Elkhart has been home to Mennonite denominational offices since 1974. Church leaders were hoping to remain there until completion of a proposed new facility in 2010.

Marty Bender, left, associate director of U.S. Ministries, and Becky Tyson, U.S. Ministries department assistant, sort through files in preparation for moving to the new location of Mennonite Mission Network in Elkhart. — Photo by MMN

But those plans have changed, and Mennonite Church USA Executive Leadership and Mennonite Mission Network will relocate to a new office in Elkhart. The move is scheduled to begin Dec. 18.

Denominational officials on Dec. 5 signed a lease for a vacant building that had housed a credit union. The two-story, 20,000-square-foot facility is on the city’s west side, about two miles from the current office. Some remodeling is being done, such as removing the teller windows.

Executive Leadership and Mission Network employ 62 people in their Elkhart offices.

The current offices have experienced nearly two dozen water leaks in the past year, including major breaks June 21 and Nov. 5, both of which affected both floors in the east wing.

Employees have been preparing for the move, sorting through files and taking home personal items. A professional moving company as well as volunteers will be used to transport equipment, furniture, files and other things to the new office.

Contact information for the new offices of Mission Network and Executive Leadership — phone numbers, mailing addresses and e-mail addresses — will remain the same. However, making contact during the week of moving, Dec. 18-22, will be uncertain.

The present building, the tallest in the city, was erected in 1923 as the 200-room Hotel Elkhart. But its future was in doubt in 1974 when Mennonite Board of Missions, having outgrown its original facility, purchased the building for $1.

Extensive renovation created commercial space on the ground floor and the second- and third-floor offices, which would be occupied by MBM and other Mennonite Church organizations. Five floors of apartments were also created, administered by Greencroft Retirement Communities, then part of MBM.

Mennonite offices became tenants rather than landlords in 1996, when they sold the building to Elkhart Housing Partnership.

This year denominational officials approved a capital campaign to build a new office building on property adjacent to Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminary.