New outreach ministry opens at Westside Shopping Center in southwest Baltimore

A former eye doctor’s office at Westside Shopping Center is now a storefront ministry, adding a service-oriented anchor to one of southwest Baltimore’s busiest retail corridors. Archbishop William E. Lori blessed the Holy Family Catholic Worker outreach ministry on April 23, 2026, inside the center at 2413 Frederick Avenue.

The new space is meant to do more than distribute supplies. Father Michael Murphy said he did not want to go into the community and tell people what they need, but instead planned to spend time listening and accompanying people. The ministry is designed as a resource hub, connecting neighbors with support and services close to home, in a part of the city where transportation barriers can make even basic errands difficult.

Stacey Wells said the storefront will include a food pantry and diapers for families, and an expungement clinic was planned for May 16, 2026. Archbishop Lori called the site “a new place of vision” where people in need are truly seen. The dedication drew elected officials, nonprofit leaders, community members, students, religious sisters, deacons and priests, including Baltimore City Council President Zeke Cohen.

For Derwin Hannah, president of the Carrollton Ridge Community Association, the opening carried a simple local meaning. He said every positive moment in the community means everything. That sentiment fits a neighborhood where residents often deal with overlapping pressures tied to housing, poverty, health and isolation, and where a walk-in storefront can feel more accessible than a formal institution.

The location itself underscores the strategy. HR Retail describes Westside Shopping Center as more than 200,000 square feet, with two signalized entrances and six access points, serving a densely populated west Baltimore market. Property data puts about 5,974 people within a half-mile of the center and 19,822 within one mile, with average household income near the site at about $41,221 within a half-mile. Nearby Carrollton Ridge has about 1,635 residents, a median household income of $45,840 and a median age of 38.6.

The ministry’s arrival also extends a pattern at the shopping center, which has become a public-facing site for Archdiocese outreach. In August 2025, the Archdiocese and Baltimore Police held a gun buyback there and collected 410 guns in a single weekend, bringing the total to 1,056 guns collected since the program began three years earlier. In June 2025, the Archdiocese said it had raised more than $100,000 over two years for gun buybacks and its Grief Ministry.

A Morgan State University study has noted Baltimore’s transit inequities and the way lower-income people of color are more likely to rely on public transit, a reality that gives added weight to a neighborhood storefront like this one. At Westside Shopping Center, the question now is whether a retail address can also become a dependable place for basic help, personal dignity and follow-through.