Pastor David Brickey of the Church of the Open Door in Maple Grove has a vision.

“This area here, we want to build it into the landscape,” he says.

The church plans to open 12 tiny homes on its property for those without shelter.

“We use the home to be able to provide a deep and rich community that has proven itself to lead people to healing and wholeness,” Brickey notes.

The homes would be like those in sacred settlements in Roseville and St. Paul.

Typically, tiny homes, about the size of a fish house, cost around $35,000 each to build.

Eight would house people considered chronically homeless, while four others would be home for volunteers, who the church calls ‘intentional neighbors.’

“It provides permanent housing for people so they can build deep roots and really experience that sense of family,” explains Rose Larson, the church’s associate pastor. “It’s really inviting people who have experienced homelessness to come in and live in a community that supports them, walks alongside them.”

The church says there will be a rigorous screening process in place and that people with a sex offense background or a violent criminal history will not be allowed to participate.

Larson reiterated some of those protocols at a recent Maple Grove City Council meeting.

“Safety and thorough background checks, thorough vetting and a long relational application process is involved in inviting neighbors to be part of the sacred settlement,” she told council members.

A group called ‘No Settlement Maple Grove’ says it has safety concerns and that the settlement will not be a sober community.

At the meeting, a Comstock Lane resident named Dave told the council, “Our message is clear. No sacred settlement should proceed without meaningful community engagement.”

He raised concerns about what would happen if the settlement didn’t turn out to be a ‘clean, responsive and safe place.’

“They don’t have a permitting and licensing requirement that will protect them,” he said. “What safeguards are in place to protect both the residents and the broad community in such a scenario? No one stands more to lose if this settlement is poorly managed than the residents living nearby and the residents of the settlement.”

Others were supportive of the church plan.

“People will not get into this situation to mess this up,” declared Julius Rennie, who says he’s worked in violence prevention with at-risk people. “No one is going to get housed and throw away that opportunity.”

5 EYEWITNESS NEWS visited numerous homes in the neighborhood around the church property.

No one would speak on camera, but people’s comments varied.  

Some residents say they believe in the project and feel the proposed site is far enough from private homes.

Others told 5 EYEWITNESS NEWS they are opposed because of safety reasons.

One woman said, ‘It would be nerve-wracking to have the settlement near my home.’

A Maple Grove spokesperson says the church does not need zoning or permits before building a sacred settlement.

A state law that went into effect in 2024 says that sacred communities are a legal form of housing if they meet specific conditions, including that between 33% and 40% of the homes must be occupied by volunteers.

Once the settlement is in place, the church is required to submit a report to the city, showing it’s following the law and abiding by the state housing regulations.

In a statement, ‘No Settlement Maple Grove’ says it’s urging the church to form a team that includes neighbors and representatives from the church and from the Settled organization, which has set up other sacred settlements.  

The statement adds: “This team would work together towards solutions to mitigate our concerns, including the potential presence of weapons on-site and the lack of a sober living environment or professional resources onsite for those struggling with addiction.”

Both pastors say at the other two settlements, there have been no safety issues.

“We stand on two-and-a-half years so far in those sacred settlements with zero crime, zero neighbor complaints, zero police activity for any sort of negative reason,” Brickey told the council. “And a whole lot of healing.”

.Church leaders hope to have the tiny homes up and running by the summer of 2026.

They say until then, they plan to do plenty of community engagement — explaining what the project is all about.

“I think about the 72 people just in Maple Grove that are experiencing homelessness and sleeping through nights like last night,” Brickey says. “They’re real humans waiting on the other side of our courage, and so we believe in it, that’s why we’re doing it.”