Holidays are over, but need persists

For two months each year, the telephone at Middleton Outreach Ministry (MOM) rings off the wall—mostly with calls from happy-sounding voices offering canned food, frozen turkeys, money, Christmas gifts, and volunteer help—especially for our annual Christmas Dinner (feeding 380 people) as well as this year’s “Sharing Christmas” (gifting 286 families made up of 1100 persons). Thank you, one and all!

But when the phone rings now, it's usually a family looking for help. Ouch!

Last Friday we answered 16 requests for assistance from people hurting in one way or the other: A sad, scared mom looking for a place to stay…. An embarrassed, humiliated dad swallowing his pride to ensure his wife and kids find food and shelter…. A guy looking desperately for work…. Another anxious over unmet medical bills…. A working couple seeking help with an unexpected auto repair.

You get the picture. The poor are with us year-round, not only during the Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays. Their stories of quiet desperation are each unique and may be hard for us to imagine, but with proper help, many of our client friends can and do turn their lives around.

To help those lives stabilize and turn around, we gratefully ask the Spirit of Giving to continue.

Thanks to more than 600 year-end gifts that ranged from $2 to $10,000, MOM was able to meet our 2006 goals for donations and the number of people served. While 75 percent of those gifts were $100 or less, gifts received between November 15 and December 31 added up to over $200,000. That’s 43 percent of our annual budget—all received in a few weeks!

Our goal in 2007 is that even more low-income families regain stability in their housing and thus in their lives. Together we can make it happen, in several ways:

• An Eviction Prevention matching grant of up to $200 can help pay back rent or a security deposit (no more than once in a year, twice in a lifetime). Historically, more than 80 percent of clients who receive Eviction Prevention grants are still in their same housing 6 months later. In 2006 we helped 245 families with these grants. Our 2007 goal is 275.
  
• A Rent Subsidy grant of $100 per month for 5 months provides longer-term assistance, along with intensive mentoring and case management. In 2007 we expect to help 25 families with rent subsidies. Historically, 100 percent of our clients who have finished the 5-month program are still stable in their same housing 12 months later.
  
• We strongly encourage clients to use MOM’s Food Pantry and Clothing Closet so they can focus their limited dollars on rent, utilities, and other non-negotiable expenses. Clients receive five days’ worth of food once every 30 days, and clothing as often as needed. We serve an average of 275 families each month.
  
• Other financial help is also available to registered MOM clients: Utility grants of up to $150 help avoid cutoffs of heat or electricity; Car repair grants up to $75 help clients whose cars are needed for jobs; and prescription grants up to $50 help uninsured clients avoid extensive health problems.

So does a one-time or limited-term financial grant actually help a family escape poverty? Yes, evidence shows a lasting impact from grants like those MOM makes. If a family can avoid eviction or find and keep stable housing, the whole family benefits. Let me count the ways that your gift makes such a difference:

1. When adults don’t have to worry about where to live, they parent better and they maintain their own relationships better.
   
2. Less stress in the home helps adults and children maintain mental and physical health.
   
3. Parents can concentrate their energies on finding or succeeding at work.
   
4. Parents and children can build connections with activities, with churches and other helping agencies, and with supportive family and friends.
   
5. Children can put down roots, instead of moving from school to school as their parents’ housing changes. They are more ready to learn and teaches who know them better can target teaching plans to meet special needs.
   
6. Children who stay in one place develop deeper friendships and are more likely to participate in sports, arts programs, or other extra-curricular activities.
   
7. Children whose families regularly use the Food Pantry and Clothing Closet will likely have better-balanced diets and better-suited clothing to help keep them healthy and socially comfortable.

MOM’s grants are no magic wand; they do not sweep away all social ills. But as part of a larger program of mentoring, case management, and connections to good neighbors and agencies, MOM’s help can truly make a difference.

As a result of the gifts received at the end of 2006, MOM plans to extend its vital services in 2007. So I bid you to remember the poor in the new year. Their needs continue throughout the year. The divine blessings and opportunities that you and I receive are for us to help change for the better the lives of those less fortunate. That indeed will make for a Happy New Year!

Editor’s note: Joan Deming, MOM’s Director of Resource Development, contributed to this story.

© 2005 Middleton Outreach Ministry

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