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ST. LOUIS — A historic north ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ church is set to be demolished after it caught fire last week for the third time in two years.

The 126-year-old St. Augustine Church is owned by the city’s land bank and was assessed after last week’s fire, said Sara Freetly, spokesperson for the Land Reutilization Authority.

The post-fire inspection led to the decision to demolish the historic building, and “current efforts are underway to eliminate hazards and ensure the site is safe for the public,� Freetly said.

The building, at 3114 Lismore Street, most recently caught fire about 8:45 p.m. on March 18.

The cause of the fire is undetermined, but ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ fire Chief Dennis Jenkerson told the Post-Dispatch there are a couple of possibilities: Homeless people often take shelter in vacant buildings during chilly nights and may try to light a fire to keep warm. There is a chance the fire was intentionally set.

Another fire scorched the building in December 2022, leading to the collapse of some walls and thwarting a nonprofit’s effort to build a community center there.

The city’s land bank took ownership of the building. Then, in January this year, the building caught fire again.

The Gothic Revival-style church is in the Hyde Park neighborhood and in 2020 was put on the Missouri Alliance for Historic Preservation’s “Places in Peril� list, which named 11 buildings across Missouri that were in danger of being demolished. It was built in 1896 and served as a Catholic church until the 1970s, when it was taken over by other, smaller congregations from other denominations, according to historic preservation nonprofit Missouri Preservation.

Over time, the structure fell into disrepair. Vandals had stripped the structure of its copper, the upper balconies and archways fell, half of the windows were gone, and water damaged the roof.

Freetly, the land bank spokesperson, told the Post-Dispatch that the ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ Development Corp. has committed several million dollars to securing and stabilizing buildings in the bank’s inventory.

“LRA continues to look at ways to use more modern approaches to secure vacant buildings in its stewardship and is in active conversations with developers and community organizations to engage in the revisioning and reuse of these assets while accelerating the process of transforming vacant properties into productive uses,� she wrote in an email.

The ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ Land Reutilization Authority, the nation’s first municipal land bank, was established in 1971 to take title to the properties piling up in the city during an exodus of hundreds of thousands of people to the suburbs. Once it takes title to the land, it can sell it for less than the amount of back taxes free and clear of liens.

Last week’s fire at the church marked the latest incident of old church buildings across the city being destroyed by flames in recent years.

In 2021, a bell tower at a century-old church in the Central West End went up in flames. Last year, a fire damaged a prominent old church building in Soulard, and another destroyed the that had been transformed into a skate park.