Hundreds of people came to fill a bowl with soup Friday night at Gallery One Ten in Provo as part of a fundraiser to build a homeless shelter in Utah Valley.

Organizers said Tammy Rodeback, a Provo potter, contacted Gallery One Ten with the idea of having local potters donate ceramic bowls they had created. More than 200 bowls were sold for $5, $10 and $20 apiece Friday night, with all the proceeds going toward a homeless shelter to be built on 900 South in Provo by the Food & Care Coalition.

Every bowl purchased was filled with soup by a local catering company. Crowds of people milled the gallery carrying soup and looking at an exhibit of art done by the gallery's staff. The event, themed "What Human Beings Need," also celebrated Gallery One Ten's first anniversary.

Rodeback said she decided to get involved after hearing about the death of Larry Edward Carter, 48, who was found frozen to death on Dec. 31 in the Jeep where he had been living in the parking lot of an apartment complex.

"I didn't realize Utah County didn't have a homeless shelter," Rodeback said. "I thought it was time for Utah County to step up."

Raquel Smith Callis, director of Gallery One Ten, said she first became a homeless advocate after meeting a homeless woman and her young son in Provo 14 years ago.

"Not everyone gets a safe place to sleep at night in Provo," she said. "What we wanted to do was raise awareness about this and help everyone get their needs met. A society that allows a certain portion of its population to be disenfranchised like that is not a society I want to be a part of, and we need to make sure everyone has a place to be, to be safe, if they choose."

Paige Crosland, a senior at Timpview High School, was part of a group that raised $38,000 toward Sub for Santa this Christmas. When the group had money left over, Crosland lobbied the school to donate $3,000 toward the $10 million needed for the new homeless shelter, which the school did, she said.

Nancy Mickiewicz of the Food & Care Coalition said the group will break ground on the homeless shelter as soon as they have raised the necessary $10 million. They group has now raised $4 million.

"It is going to be transitional housing," she said. "There will be a work program and an education component, and pay-it-forward service club and mentors."

The 36,000-square-foot shelter will be built on just less than five acres, and will provide 38 private rooms with amenities, barbershop, expanded laundry and shower facilities. Twenty-six rooms will be for men, and 12 for women.

For information on the Food & Care Coalition homeless shelter fundraising campaign, call 373-1825.

Food & Care Coalition in Utah Valley (coalition data):

15,015 homeless people sought assistance in Utah last year

Nearly one-third were intact family households

Nearly half of chronically homeless people are unsheltered in Utah

In 2005, the Food & Care Coalition served 112,123 meals -- 307 a day -- to the hungry in Utah Valley

Because of 15,000 volunteer hours and donations, the coalition spends less than $6,000 a year on food and supplies.

This story appeared in The Daily Herald on page D1.