Anne’s Place, formerly Anne Frank House, was founded in 1987 as a community service project of the Adas Israel Congregation at the urging of the late Reverend John F. Steinbruck, spiritual leader of DC's Luther Place Memorial Church. A leading voice locally and nationally for the homeless, Reverend Steinbruck inspired the diverse consortium of shelters and services for homeless women and their families in DC now known as N Street Village.
He and his wife Erna Steinbruck of the Luther Place Shelter also inspired the Adas Israel congregants to respond to the housing crisis and form a group home for women, accepting the “one Church, one home” Challenge.
According to Rabbi Avis Miller, who for many years was a rabbi at Adas Israel Congregation, the group home was named Anne Frank House because “Anne benefited from being sheltered by others. It denotes interdependence with others.”
Our first project was a group home for five women with chronic mental illness that Anne’s Place, formerly Anne Frank House, operated for 8 years in a rental property.
In 1992, the Board established the Alice Burton Mentoring Fund and mentored and provided seed money to Temple Micah to found Micah House. In the 1990's, we shifted to a housing model of single occupancy, scattered-site studio apartments in Ward 3.
For 35 years, all operations and fundraising were carried out by volunteers and in 2022, with a new strategic vision to double the number of people we serve, we hired a fulltime staff person and started partnering with other congregations, like All Souls Episcopal Church and Holy Trinity Catholic Church. Today we house some of DC’s most vulnerable people in their own apartments in Northwest DC.
