COEUR d'ALENE - Right now it's a lot of overgrown weeds.

But the Union Gospel Mission in Spokane wants to transform the unused 2.7-acre lot off Haycraft Avenue into a faith-based rehabilitation center for women.

Locating in the area has been a mission goal for years. But it needs to obtain a special use permit to allow it to happen near Appleway Avenue since a piece of the land is residentially zoned, which wouldn't allow for the center.

"We've been talking about it for four and a half or five years," said Phil Altmeyer, UGM executive director on locating a facility across the state line. "Beyond that too and just the statistics, there's a huge need for it."

But some neighbors aren't sure the proposed neighbor would blend in with the rest of the neighborhood.

"I have mixed feelings," said Pat Boland, owner of Cleanco laundry and dry cleaners across the street from the site. "I don't want to be the person who says, 'not in my backyard,' but at the same time it's primarily a retail area and I'm not sure it would be a good fit."

The proposed project would be a roughly two-year transitional housing and recovery program center for women with substance abuse problems. It would offer around 35 beds for them and their children, as well as educational and other services including doctor, dental and eye clinics. There would also be a crisis service center, a nursery, and a landscaped buffer from neighbors.

Altmeyer said it could fill a niche in the Coeur d'Alene area.

"Why we're going to Coeur d'Alene is the fact that we really believe in the total person and rebuilding the spiritual area of people lives," he said. "There are just a lot of Christians there and a lot of people who want to bring a Christ-based program that's about transformation, and changing peoples' hearts: Not just dealing with exterior things, but dealing with heart issues.

"We're really responding to the community," he said.

But it's still in the preliminary stages so a cost estimate hasn't been nailed down, and the land sale is contingent upon obtaining the special use permit.

That permit hearing is scheduled to go before the Planning and Zoning Commission at 5:30 p.m. Tuesday, July 13 in the Community Room of the Coeur d'Alene Public Library. The commission could approve the permit. If someone appeals its decision it could go before the City Council later.

The property is just north of Appleway Avenue. Covered in weeds now, it sits at 196 W. Haycraft near Taco Bell, the laundromat, several homes and apartment buildings to the west.

Boland said he would be concerned that the facility could attract a transient population, making prospective customers to the laundry mat uncomfortable to be there.

"I feel there is a need for that type of facility," he said. "But I do have some concerns."

Others in the neighborhood said they are in favor of it.

"It'll be more useful than what's there now," said Chelsea Winter, who lives next door with her mother. "I think it would be good."

The mission has been in Spokane since 1951. Its women's center, the Anna Ogden Hall, opened there in 1971 and helped 112 women and children in 2009, according to the UGM 2009 impact report. Altmeyer said the mission identified a place for a facility around five years ago near Hayden Lake, before sewer problems ultimately ended the prospects there.

Steve Viers, now the head cook at the UGM men shelter in Spokane, said the faith-based recovery center turned his life from drug abuse to one back on track with his passion for cooking.

"Coming through the east door has not only made me a better man and the father God wants me to be," he said. "But it's given me back my whole life and more. My kids are back in my life and they look up to me now."