Harry Tompson Center

WHO WE ARE 

Harry Tompson Center is a day shelter that provides vital services to people experiencing homelessness in downtown New Orleans. Founded by Fr. Harry Tompson, S.J. of Immaculate Conception Church, our Jesuit principles guide us in providing a safe space where unhoused individuals can find respite and community while accessing a variety of services designed to meet their basic daily needs. We organize our services around hygiene, healthcare, housing, & hospitality. 

WHAT WE DO

When guests arrive at our Center, we take the opportunity to build personal relationships with them so that we can better meet their needs and connect them with our wide variety of services, which include access hygiene and sanitation facilities, laundry, case management, housing assistance, medical care, access to phone lines, WIFI, support programs, legal resources, and more.

We know that our services are changing peoples' lives on a daily basis. Among our proudest accomplishments is assisting over 2,000 individuals since 2013 to find stable housing, helping end their homelessness for good. 

We see an average of 200 people each day. Every individual who enters our Center is treated with love, compassion, dignity, and respect. Our team of staff and volunteers includes physicians, nurses, counselors, social workers, priests, students, and community leaders who lend their time and talents to our guests.

We are consistently reminded of the resilience of the human spirit and the presence of miracles in our day to day lives when our guests share their triumphs with us. We are often told that our presence in their lives makes them feel visible, cared for, and grateful. 

WHERE WE ARE TODAY

In 2024, we began a much-needed renovation, requiring us to build a temporary campus with only 5 showers and a few working restrooms. In October of 2025, we completed our renovation and our new facilities include the following: 10 private shower stalls (2 ADA), 6 private restroom stalls (2 ADA), 21 faucets, 5 new phone booths, a phone charging locker/station, full-service laundry for 20 individuals/day, 4 case management offices, 3 medical exam rooms, and space for our bicycle program. This is HUGE for us and even bigger for our guests! 

Crucially, we cannot do this work alone. We rely on funding from individual donors to account for more than half of our operating budget, and this year we need more support than ever to fill in the gaps. In 2024, HTC recorded 4,922 unique individuals across 30,000+ visits to the Center, each seeking at least one resource. We are happy to be able to deliver quality care, but we need your help to keep up with capacity and make sure HTC is able to keep up with the evolving needs of our unhoused community. 

We appreciate your contributions this Giving Tuesday and hope it warms your heart to know that your participation through #iGiveCatholic makes our work possible.