November Team Meeting Notes

-  Freedom Ministry Events - we have been invited to two events at Freedom Ministry.  On November 21 the community Thanksgiving will take place at 12 pm at Freedom Ministry along with the YMCA and Salvation Army.  On Dec 4th there is a Faith Musical event at 7 pm.  These invitations will be posted in the church bulletin.

-  Run, Walk and Cheer - Don will present the checks this Sunday at 10:30 for the event fundraiser.  Freedom Ministry will receive a check for $12000.  This is to be made out to PEOPLE ON THE RISE as part of our 4th Sunday initiative.  Don expressed the hope that this 4th Sunday we could engage a new crop of workers to expand our reach into the congregation.  All agreed.  The gift will provide a budget for 2016 12 Saturdays at $800 each, which is the budget for each week.

-  Prayer Warrior Team - we discussed the progress of the Prayer Warrior team of Rich and Humberto.  This seems to be going quite well but language is a barrier for further expansion.  The idea of offering this prayer support to the other Saturdays of the month is considered.  Further, Carlos has asked if he can serve on this team.  He would be greatly welcomed.  This idea will be further developed for possible implementation.

-  Coat Drive - Freedom Ministry was selected to be one of the recipients of the recent coat drive at LCPC.   Our portion is 120 coats and they will be delivered on Nov 14th during the food bank.  A plan is under development for dispersing the coats.   Beth and Ward Schneiderman will deliver the coats and thanked for the gift.

-  Financials - LeSheita Thomas will update our financial situation under separate cover.  These financial statements will be provided quarterly throughout 2016.

-  Social Media - we need to fill the gap created for a social medial team member.  Do any of our current team mates want to take this job on.  We do have a blog site and individuals are directed there for more comprehensive information http://lccmensministry.blogspot.com/

The Church has a new Roof

This past few weeks have been pretty hectic for the PEOPLE ON THE RISE food bank ministry.  The surgery of Pastor Antoine is filly complete and he is returning to good vision again, praise the Lord.

• New Roof - a new roof has been built over the existing structure and we can expect the wet and cold now to be under better control as a result.  Due to the efforts of Pastor and his team, the town of Plainfield gave final approval and the final steps were completed recently.  In addition the outside of the building has received a coat of paint courtesy of our hard working pastor and several sections of new fencing have also been added.
• New Furnace - a new furnace plan is under way with the approval and permitting processes already begun.  The old electric furnace has been removed and a new gas model is now in place.  With town permits, PSE&G will run gas lines into the basement of the building and we should see much better conditions for worship and all the other uses the ministry has.  We are all very excited.
• Liberty Corner WALK, RUN AND CHEER has been completed for another year.  This event is a fund raiser for three local charities and PEOPLE ON THE RISE is one of them.  We do not have the final accounting yet but expect that the very successful event will surpass last year's total.  We could receive as much as $10,000 for this ministry.
• 4th Saturday - our goal is to open an additional Saturday of the month, which means we would be open every Saturday bringing food and healthcare products to our clients.  The team is meeting next week and we should know more about when and if this will be completed.
• Winter Coats - We have received a very generous gift of 120 coats for adults and children from Liberty Corner Church.  These coats will be available shortly and we expect to take delivery November 14 during the hours of the food bank.  We thank our sponsors for this most generous and unexpected gift.

Coffee Now Served at Food Bank

Yesterday was our August Liberty Corner at the Food Bank.  We had a real nice turnout and over 75 folks received supplemental food for their families.  I wanted to give you a quick report of our team's progress in serving on the mission field:

1. Antoine's Health - if you are not aware of this, Antoine has been suffering with glaucoma in both eyes.  He underwent surgery on eye 1 and suffered a severe side effect.  He has now had a second surgery on the eye and thankfully is back to normal and corrected vision in that eye.  He now faces a second eye surgery within the next two weeks, so please keep him in your prayers.
2. Church Facility - the Freedom Ministry facility has been inadequate for water leaks and heating furnace for the past year.  Now a plan is under review at the town for both shortcomings.  Within two weeks a new roof with be installed on top of the old one.  This new roof with use donated materials and volunteer labor to complete but we expect this to be accomplished just after labor day.  The furnace is now the top priority and Antoine is developing a plan to remove and replace the old electric furnace with a new gas version.  PSEG has agreed to run a gas line into the church. The dream is that this can be completed by end of month October.  Finally, the drive through bank stalls will be removed at that time and the last item is to replace the carpeting in the sanctuary.  This is needed due to water stains from the leaky roof.  By year's end wouldn't it be wonderful if all of this could be accomplished?
3. Coffee - we served sponsored coffee for the first time this past week.  We have a coffee pot and each week that we serve ins the future, we will also serve coffee.  This is intended to increase hospitality of the event and the evidence is there that this can done.  We served 50 cups of coffee and ran out at the end of the morning.  This idea is a winner.
4. Run, Walk Cheer - we have become a designated recipient of the run, walk, cheer fund raiser along with two other groups.  We are excited to support this event on October 17th.  In that spirit we have been invited on September 13 to conduct a Minute for Mission during worship at all three services.  Pastor Antoine Thomas has been invited to speak and has confirmed his plan to attend.  Great news for the food bank team and for Run, Walk and Cheer.
5. Next Event for our Team - we need to start planning for our second annual Mac and Cheese drive for the benefit of the food bank.  Last year we received over 100 pans of Mac and Cheese.  This year we are hoping for even more - lets set a goal of 125 this year.  We will talk next about the timing of this drive.

Team Meeting Held this Week

Thanks for attending the meeting last evening.  We welcome Tammy Taylor to the team and thank her for attending as well. (she brought Mark along and got his input as well).  Please find below notes I have taken regarding our agenda topics for the meeting:

1. Coffee - it is agreed that coffee service is a big enhancement of hospitality to the clients and volunteers.  By serving we hope to increase interaction of the groups to break down barriers that may exist.  For the balance of the summer we will serve two Saturdays a month.  We will not ask the new congregation volunteers until we have an opportunity to engage with them.  We will use the church(Freedom Ministry) coffee pot and bring coffee, milk and sweet tastes with us.  A trip to Cosco will be completed.
2. Fourth Saturday - we have agreed to introduce a fourth Saturday under the Liberty Corner sponsorship.  We will commence this additional food bank day after discussions with Antoine and the volunteers of FMP.  We need to budget the costs of this addition and LaSheita will forward a model for financial understanding of these costs.  Further, we will engage with the Union County Food bank so that we gather more understanding of the process for food procurement.  LaSheita will follow for us.
3. 501C3 - this process will be completed in the fall with the return of Law School students return to Rutgers.  This is an important step for fundraising.
4. Mission Team - we have been invited to present to the Liberty Corner Mission team in September.  Don and Andy to discuss prior to the meeting.

Gifts Received this Week

Dear Freedom Ministry Partnership Team:

I have good news and bad news to report to you this  morning.  On the bad side, I freaked my back out at the Food Bank on Saturday and have been in bed for 3 days.  What an experience, never before a problem with the back.  Hoping for quick recovery.

On the good news side of things.  Lyle Bailey and his brother David brought 200 cases of fresh vegetables to the food bank Saturday.  This went over very well as you can imagine.  Big thanks goes out to Lyle and David.  David drove the vegetables from North Carolina where he has founded a ministry of serving the poor with food collected from participating farms.  We are looking at ways that we can partner with David for the future.

Finally, we received a gift of $25,000 last week.  This is awesome and terrific given that our goals this year included raising funds to support the food bank.  Our target was $25,000.  Unbelievable.  LaSheita and Antoine were so appreciative as this came at just the right time to support additional food purchases and contribute to the furnace project.  LaSheita will be providing us monthly accounting of funds dispersed from this funding.

Lastly, in discussions about how our Partnership can further serve the food bank, we have been asked to consider taking the fourth Saturday during July and August and be the primary workers that week.  We will have help from Raul and Walter, but basically we will need 6 workers each week including set up, registration and hand out.  Please consider who we should invite for this service, of course, including our selves.

Pretty good week for the team,

Andy

Jodi holds an Event

Getting ready to go to the food bank but first wanted to send you this update.  Jodi Miquel works at Matheny School as art teacher and she held an event last week making salad bowels with her students.  They then sold the bowels for $10 each and donated the proceeds to Freedom Ministry food bank.  She raised $1166 from the event.

The Lord is good all the time.  What a wonderful thing.  Just wanted you to know.  If you see Jodi at church, give her a big hug.

Tammy Taylor joins the Team

First let me introduce Tammy Taylor who has agreed to join our team.  Tammy has a world of passion for Christ and is very excited about our ministry of serving the poor and supporting the Freedom Ministry volunteers and partners in Plainfield, NJ.  Tammy will be taking the champion role in fundraising for us.  Our next meeting will take place July 12th.  Please check you calendars for availability.

A final huge thank you to Jeanette Branca for creating our new logo and supporting us as we finalized the design through one editing process.  We are blessed that she "volunteered" after we begged her to do so.  Thank you Jeanette, you are the best.

Freedom Ministry is now partnering with an Hispanic congregation using their facility.  This is a huge positive step for the ministry and is providing many opportunities for cross congregation support and fulfillment.  The facility plan is rounding into shape with the roof and the furnace replacement in the plan.  Funding is being sought for both projects but labor has been identified for the program and hoping to find appropriate hardware for replacement materials.  Habitat for Humanity is playing a key role in donating materials for the roof.  This is huge.

Finally, Lyle Bailey has been in contact through his brother who has started a food program in North Carolina.  The program is converting fresh vegetables into case lot for donation to clients.  We have a commitment for 200 cases  of mixed garden vegetables coming soon.  The good Lord is amazing in his support and grace for us.

Thanks everyone for your foundational work on this ministry.  We have moved far and many miles to go before we sleep.

Church of the Palms Interview

BRUCE HEDGEPETH TELECONFERENCE

2.2.15

AGENDA

• Bruce Hedgepeth, Associate Pastor, Church of the Palms, Sarasota, Fl.  He is responsible for the Food Pantry.  He reports to Steve McConnell.
• Background - Discussed with him briefly about our journey starting with Men's Ministry expansion and community outreach events that resulted in our meeting Pastor Antoine Thomas via a bible study.
• Freedom Ministry Food Bank Overview - 3 Saturdays per month, County Relief Source, Volunteers - 8, 450 clients per month, distribution - church parking lot/sanctuary, client demo - 70% hispanic, none are members of church
• Church of the Palms Overview - client base, church members, food sources, leadership of volunteers, scope of solution

FEEDBACK

• Church of the Palms in Sarasota, Fl has been supporting a food ministry for 10 years.  They serve 16,000 clients per year via a church based FOOD PANTRY on their campus.  The food pantry is supported by about 80 volunteers in the church who participate in a variety of duties including manning the panty 5 days per week, packing the client bags and conducting a special offering service yearly around Thanksgiving.  The program costs are $98,000 per year.  They are running a surplus primarily due to efficient food access efforts by the staff.
• The source of food comes from a variety of means.  The church does provide a paid staff member who sources the food for the pantry.  The main source is a local county FOOD BANK called All Faith Food Bank serving over 100 pantries, soup kitchens and others in Sarasota.  The food is purchased from the food bank.  The food bank is a non profit operation that contracts with government, manufacturers and grocery operations locally and then sells their product to the pantries in the community.  Some food is a little cheaper than a grocery store, some is free including government sourced food.  Some is donated from stores and manufacturers.
• The United Way 211 in Sarasota has a special food and services related program in which clients are registered to find out about services.  The client list for the Food Pantry comes from United Way primarily as clients are directed to differing Food Pantries in the county.  This service expands access to client information, and coordination.
• Funding of the program is primarily via special offerings to the Food Pantry, similar to our Honduras Christmas Offering.  They generate $40,000 per year in a once per year special offering at a worship service near Thanksgiving.  They also receive an average of $3000 per month from friends of the Pantry out of the congregation.  Finally, they have received direct government grants which have totalled nearly $20,000 per year from FEMA and other government agencies.  The Food Pantry operation is housed in a conference room (think Multi Purpose) with moveable shelving.  This lockable center is where food packages are assembled and inventory of food is stored.  The distribution takes place at an outside door entrance where clients are greeted, bags dispersed and other food items selected like fresh vegetables.

Church of the Palms has developed many best practices over their 10 years in ministry.  Some of their ideas offer us in the FMP some possible areas to explore.  We can review this at our next meeting.

Team Meeting Held at Liberty Corner

FREEDOM MINISTRIES PARTNERSHIP

Team Meeting Notes

1.20.15

A team meeting was held at LCPC to discuss the progress of ministry plans to support Freedom Ministry Food Bank and to engage the congregation of Liberty Corner.  This meeting was held to initiate planning for 2015.  We will review progress in this regard in February.  The key areas of agreed actions are highlighted below:

EXPANSION OF FOOD BANK

The idea of expanding the food bank was discussed.  Consideration for additional days beyond the 3 days per month was considered.  The main conclusion reached was that we are not yet able to adequately serve the clients on three days per month.  Until we can expand supplies of food to meet this need we will table consideration for additional expansion.

Ally Garcia has suggested that promoting the concept of Ziti in pans delivered frozen should be pursued within LCPC.  The congregation currently supports shut in members with this approach and it could be used in the food bank as well.  This approach will be explored to enhance food supplies given out.   In addition we should explore meeting with food suppliers in the local area to determine if donations of their products could be accomplished.

COMMUNICATION TO CONGREGATIONS

A real need exists to promote two way communications within the congregation, volunteers and clients.  We have a blog site for our team but social media methods should be considered.  Further, we need to communicate within the teams of the church including youth, mission and session.  Ally Garcia has offered to define these methods and report back in February.

COMMUNITY COLLABORATION

The Plainfield community has a number of services offered to support food for the poor.  We need to explore these additional sources so that we can understand the full scope of community response to feeding the needy, particularly the undocumented worker community.  The Catholic Church, Salvation Army and government services need to be contacted and interviewed to map out how the food bank fits into the larger community response.  Mert and Doug have agreed to examine this planning item and report back.

Rich and Bert will explore the client side via out reach and consideration to see what other enhancements could be delivered to help lift the clients.  Language barriers, spiritual development and other areas will be examined. A prayer list will be developed for the clients after determining their prayer needs. Rich and Bert will interview clients 2 times per month to find their needs.

NEXT MEETING

Oue next meeting will take place Feb 24 at 6:30pm