Philanthropy Today
Philanthropy Today
Center of Hope Ministry on the GMCF Community Hour Show Episode - 266
We explore how the Center of Hope warming shelter keeps people safe, fed, and connected during winter nights while partnering across the city to build a path from crisis to stability. Stories of medical emergencies averted, and job-and-housing wins reveal the power of trust at night.
• what the warming shelter offers overnight
• collaboration with local agencies for wraparound care
• founding story and purpose rooted in compassion
• myths about homelessness and employment challenged
• life-saving interventions and guest success stories
• new location at 901 Yuma Street with larger capacity
• immediate needs for cots, mattress protectors, and snacks
• Christmas breakfast buffet and gift plans
• volunteer roles for opening, closing, and overnight support
You can find more about them on their website, www.thecenterofopemhk.com
Philanthropy Today is brought to you by the Greater Manhattan Community Foundation. In this episode, we feature a recently broadcast segment of the GMCF Community Hour, as heard on news radio KMAN. The GMCF Community Hour continues in a timely topic here on this Monday as we uh get into the holidays. And you know, I'm looking at the uh at the at the weather forecast, and I don't know if we're gonna need you for a while, but but there is a need.
SPEAKER_01:There is a need, and maybe not right now. Maybe not right now. It's the holidays, but there has been a couple of below degrees, and before you know it, yes, we have January and February. We know that that's it's hard.
SPEAKER_00:She's Angela Stoutenberg, she's a director of operations for the Center of Hope Ministry, and I guess you're now what the chair? Is that right?
SPEAKER_02:Uh yes. Uh I was verted in this summer at our uh board meeting as the chair for the Center Foot Ministry and for Jeremy Harmon.
SPEAKER_00:Well, I was gonna I was gonna introduce your name as Jeremy Harmon. So you just kind of showed up and you decided to come and talk too, so we're delighted to have you here. It's good to have you back. Good to have you back, yeah.
SPEAKER_01:We're so happy.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. Well, there's a lot of things that are going on here with the Center of Hope Ministry. And Angela, I'm gonna let you kind of um talk first. Give us a 30-second elevator speech about what Center of Hope Ministry is.
SPEAKER_01:Well, Center of Hope Ministry is a warming shelter overnight. So what we do is after dinner at the common table, when nobody has anywhere else to go that needs to stay warm for the night, they come to us and they're able to have a peaceful, safe night's rest when they come to us. And not only that, but if they miss dinner at the common table or still hungry, we provide them when they first come in with um food. We have DARAs and different organizations that come in and bring us dinners and snacks. A lot of donations of snacks come in that they get to have. We turn on the TV, they get to watch movies, they do art, they play games with each other when they come in, just to kind of give them that relaxation and that feel of like this is kind of home and this is my family and friends before they go out for the night.
SPEAKER_00:And Jeremy, you know, with uh with the work that you do at Citter of Hope Ministry, and and you know, we're it's it's part of that big safety net that we have for a lot of folks that that don't have a place to go. And and you know, you have your aspect uh that that you do there at Center of Hope, but you also work with other organizations, emergency shelter, be able. There's others here. You know, Angela, you referred to common table. It's all part of that mix where we want to make sure that people can, you know, make it through the the colder days.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, absolutely, Dave. So it is it is part of the wraparound services when it comes to the individual care of each of the individuals that we see through our doors. Many of the other services will see them or know them. So that cooperation and collaboration uh between the agencies here is one of the things that really makes Manhattan special, especially in the social service network. And and we're just we're proud to be a part of it. Uh, we're proud to uh be able to collaborate with each of the amazing organizations like Be Able, the Common Table, uh the Emergency Shelter, Um Pawnee Mental Health, Kons of Prairie. Um that there's just a lot going on to really be that safety net of a safety net, if you will. And and so we're just we're really proud and happy to be a part of it.
SPEAKER_00:Maybe it should be a safety blanket.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:As opposed to a safety net. No, it wasn't a pun. It was just as a play. As a play. You know, so you know, you you keep people warm. Yes, you know, when you have cold, cold temperatures. But you're an organization, Angela, that's still relatively in its infancy. You've only been up and operating what, five, six years?
SPEAKER_01:Five years. This is our well, fifth winter.
SPEAKER_00:And that first one was just brutal.
SPEAKER_01:It it was very brutal, and that is what made all of this start, which is from our founder, Will. And if it wasn't for Will saying, what is everybody going to do in the cold at night and trying to find places to go? We wouldn't be here. And he just one by one started telling all of us the story. And one by one, God put it on our hearts, and we all just started coming in and giving in areas that we were had the talent for God to serve in.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I thanks for bringing up Will, because I remember him distinctly. You know, you know, he's a big, loving dude.
SPEAKER_01:Yes.
SPEAKER_00:And with just a vibrant personality, and you can see how he just wanted to see this come to fruition. Passion. And that that's that's life-changing. And in many respects, and Jeremy, I want to direct this over to you. Life-saving. Um, you know, we had a story a couple of years ago where you had uh a young man that that near that that nearly died. We recognized him at the CFAs, uh, you know, because he had a great story, and you know, that's a story that I understand continues to to prosper. So I mean, you've got some of these great guest stories.
SPEAKER_02:Oh, yeah, absolutely, Dave. And and that's that's really just kind of modeling after the love your neighbor, meet your meet them individually where they are. Um, that model is very, very effective for the many of the ones that we see because uh they tend to be the ones that would fall through the cracks uh for one reason or another. Um and uh and so being that that catch uh is is very important. It is um life-saving. Um the the stories, man, there's so many. You know, we've we've already seen so many this year, uh, the ones from last year. Um Angela may have a specific story um that that she can share. She's really um on the ground touching um with with the individuals.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I mean, there is so many stories that I could touch on. Just it's a different there's a difference between the daytime and the nighttime, right? And so be able, they take care of all the resources and stuff at night, but when they come into or in the day, but when they come to us at night, it's a very different story because it's they're coming there for rest, their peace. They've just been out in the cold all day long, you know, if they have jobs and stuff like that, which it is kind of a misconception that everybody that's with us does not, they're just homeless and they don't do anything. There's plenty of them there that have jobs. We had somebody that came in in the middle of the night last year, and I could tell something was not right after he got off work and came in. He looked very sickly, but he just, you know, I gotta go to work tomorrow. Everything's gonna be okay. I'm just gonna wait till my ex-wife comes and picks me up. I gotta go to work tomorrow. And I said, no, this isn't gonna work. And I took him to the hospital and all his organs were failing. He was lying. He was dying too. So, you know, there's misconceptions there. We have another gentleman that we still work with, and there's certain people that we work with that, of course, be able works with them, but they just need a little extra help up and they connect with us differently because in the middle of the night they're more vulnerable to be able to tell their story, to kind of talk with us a little more. They can't sleep in the night because of nightmares or trauma. So they come to us at the desk when there's a few of us, and they come and want to talk to us a little bit more deeply about their stories, and then we're able to connect with us because we have that trust, and we have somebody named Derek that he was able with us to connect with us and then start getting, we got him a job, and then after he got that job, I was able to get him that job through some friends of mine, and now he's moved up this year to a higher position as a supervisor. He has been able to get into housing, he's at in the beable housing. As soon as I saw someone graduate, I said, It's your turn. You're in a good place where it's your turn. And right now he's never had a vehicle before. So he asked me, What are the steps to get a vehicle? I said, Well, you've been having a consistent paycheck. Let's go to your bank and figure out how to get you a car loan. And he's in the middle of getting a vehicle right now.
SPEAKER_00:These are things you probably wouldn't think would be possible. Yeah. How cool that you're able to arrange that.
SPEAKER_01:But he never thought that this was possible. And it's like, it it started out with how am I gonna get a job? I need a job, the shelter is closing soon. What do I do? Which they don't really think about sometimes until the end. And they realize, oh, wait, the shelter is about to close. I need to figure out something because I'm not gonna have a place to sleep at night. For now, we're just a winter warming shelter, but in the name of Jesus Christ, we're gonna be open all year someday to be able to have somewhere to sleep at night. And then it's trying to find a job. And with connections that a lot of us have, we're able to get them a job. And then the next thing you know, they're able to become a supervisor. And then the next thing you know, they're able to get in a program of housing because Jeremy, let's talk a bit about uh well, give us some perspective.
SPEAKER_00:Let's talk about the current location because you have been in different locations throughout the last five years. Where are you at now? Oh the warming shelter.
SPEAKER_02:And um, this this year's amazing. Obviously, uh, you recall this last winter we were able to move into a downtown location uh at first congregational church. Very, very grateful for them opening their doors uh because we knew that being in downtown, being in the downtown area is where we needed to be to meet the need. Uh through uh through a lot of effort and collaboration with the city of Manhattan over the summer and early fall, we were able to uh enter into a lease agreement with the city, and we are now operating at 901 Yuma Street at the Douglas School Annex. And it's I mean, we've we're we're already seeing numbers that far exceed what we expected, um, but we knew that the need would be greater than the space would be able to accommodate where we were before. So uh we're we're just very grateful for the for the larger space with more capacity and more capability to be able to really, really meet this this need.
SPEAKER_00:Angela, what are some things you need right now?
SPEAKER_01:Some things that we are in need of right now, like Jeremy said, we're growing and we're seeing more and more people. And thank goodness for the Douglas Center for that, because it's helped a lot being able to have that larger space. We do have families come in, so um we kind of need like little smaller like cots, but we also have a lot of larger men come in that are just super tall and we their legs are hanging off the cot. So we need something we need the cots that are a little bit larger to fit them in. We also use uh twin size mattress protectors as a part of you know keeping things safe and clean that we put over the cots and the pads, and so those they need to be changed out when they get torn or when they get dirty because you can't really wash them very well. Snacks is always something that we need. We could always use snacks and this Christmas, which is very important, um, when they wake up on Christmas morning, not only are they gonna have gifts, but we're doing a Christmas buffet breakfast. And so if you go to our website or our Facebook, you can sign up for one of the meals to make to bring to us Christmas morning or the day before so we can heat up for them so they can have that breakfast buffet.
SPEAKER_00:Jeremy, do you have a need for volunteers?
SPEAKER_02:Dave, there's always a need for volunteers.
SPEAKER_00:It's like I know all the answers, I just need to get it from you.
SPEAKER_02:Absolutely. Um, I mean, volunteers is is critical to any organization here, but but especially with what we do, uh, there's daytime opportunities for volunteers uh that we could connect people that may not be able to um operate overnight. Uh our opening shifts or our closing shifts um is yeah, volunteers. That's I mean, we're an all-volunteer board, uh, but thankfully, through the generosity of the of the Goldstein Foundation trustees and GMCF, uh, we were able to get a grant to allow us to hire uh for the first time ever uh two individuals, uh one full-time, one part-time. Uh the part-time is a college student who's currently on break. And we're also interviewing uh another uh volunteer that's that's been consistent with us uh to be able to really fill those gaps where it is challenging for volunteers. Um being an overnight shelter. We will always have someone awake and up and ready to respond to whether it's a drop-off or someone that needs to be woken up early in the morning to go to work or whatever the case may be because their safety is paramount.
SPEAKER_00:They are the warming shelter. You can find more about them on their website, the centerofopehmhk.com. Repeat that. The centerofope mhk.com. Angela Stoutenberg, always a delight to have you in.
SPEAKER_01:I'd love to see you. It is so great to be here and to have seen you today.
SPEAKER_00:And Jeremy Harmon, same to you. Same to you. Good. Merry Christmas to both of you. And and I'm I'm sure everything at the shelter will be uh as merry as you can make it, Katie.
SPEAKER_01:Oh, it's about to be great, for they're gonna love Christmas.
SPEAKER_00:We'll be back in just a couple of moments in our final segment. Jayna Ukruschenko will be joining us here on the GMCF Community Hour, giving us an idea of some things that are coming up and a preview of our next show, which will be next year. Wow. On the GMCF Community Hour here on News Radio KMAN.