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Hoosier United Methodist News Archives
| Hoosier United Methodists together |
January 2005 |
Focus on Fletcher Place:
Serving into the future
By Jan Jett
INDIANAPOLIS - A wide, welcoming staircase invite all who enter the doors of Fletcher Place Community Center to feel comfortable and safe. At the corner of State and Prospect Streets in a poverty area of Indianapolis, the center fulfills its mission to serve the least. Men, women and children find hope, solace and have some material needs met here.
A thrift store allows clients to select needed items through a shopping card procedure. Everything is free. The card is issued every 30 days and sets a limit as to what may be bought. Homeless individuals are provided with a hygiene kit, blanket and new underwear and socks twice-a-month in addition to the shopping card. Those making contributions to the store are asked to call before bringing donations. Items brought on hangers need limited sorting and reach the store racks quickly.
Round tables in the large, light upstairs dining hall provide opportunities for people to talk with one another, volunteers and staff. They can relax, read newspapers, and be warm and comforted.
Breakfast is served on Thursday and Tuesday mornings; meals are served Monday and Wednesday, from 3:30 to 4:30 p.m. Meals are provided and served by volunteer groups from churches and organizations throughout the city and neighboring areas.
Some congregations bring more volunteers than needed to serve a meal, so there will be volunteers to listen and talk with clients. One blind student, who always looked forward to being there, was truly excited when he heard Spanish being spoken. The student joined the group at a table to practice his school-taught Spanish.
The preschool began 75 years ago and continues to provide experiences for children in spacious rooms that are full of light and appropriate activities. A fenced playground allows children to make noise and use up energy outside the building.
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Men, women and children find hope, solace and have some material needs met here. |
Children are further served through books available to them in a children's library that was started and is continued by a Sunday school class from St. Luke's UMC. The library serves ages pre-school through age 12; books have no due date. A monetary donation from the Colts was matched by Scholastic Books thus providing staff the opportunity to supplement donated children's book. Half Price Bookstore will exchange and trade books so that only appropriate materials are on the shelves. Currently, more Spanish-language books and religious story books are needed. The library would like to have children's Bibles for their patrons. Donations are welcomed.
History in progress
A 13-page history of Fletcher Place Ministries is in progress. The first date associated with the center is 1849, when Fletcher Methodist Episcopal Church was started by Roberts Park Chapel (now Roberts Park UMC) in a railroad depot.
In 1882 the building which was to become Fletcher Place Community Center at College and Fletcher was built. Now, 122 years later, the center is in a renovated building at State and Prospect.
In 1934, less than 10 percent of families in Fletcher Place Church were not on public relief of some sort.
In 1949, Indiana Methodist Bishop Richard Raines had the community canvassed and discovered the highest rate of juvenile delinquency in the entire city was in this neighborhood. Lilly Foundation helped provide half of the salary for a Program Director to help start Fletcher Place Community Center.
This author remembers teaching a boys' cooking class at Fletcher Place as a Butler University student in 1956. Another Butler student recalls the concern of her father at her volunteering to help monitor the gym program and interact with teenagers in such a dangerous area of Indianapolis. At that time, Butler gave credit for required volunteer service.
This tradition continues with University of Indianapolis students, whose motto includes education and service volunteer. Under the guidance of UI Sociology Professor Toni Peabody, students connect with the real world and diminish barriers between homeless and poverty families, and college students. Summer interns and nursing students also provide specific programming at the community center.
Programs expanded
In 1992, the Rev. Jessi Langlie was appointed executive director of Fletcher Place Community Center. Under her leadership and with her guidance programs have been expanded and new programs added. The staff now includes in addition to the executive director, persons for maintenance, food aid, pre-school teacher and assistant, youth director, Survival Skills for Women and for Men instructors and a clothing store helper.
Staff members are often hired from graduates of the Survival Skills programs, thus giving individuals experience and further help in perfecting skills that will be marketable and remove them from poverty. In 2003, an assistant director for Fletcher Place Ministries hired the Rev. Ken Williamson to supervise six staff, coordinate volunteers and provide oversight of programs.
Fletcher Place Community Center receives no government money. It is funded by The United Methodist Church plus grants and donations from a variety of sources.
A building fund campaign was developed to meet the expense of purchasing and renovating the new building. It is indeed a house built by uniting people of faith and hope in breaking the cycle of poverty.
The Indianapolis Star recently reported that the Indianapolis Foundation awarded the Fletcher Place Community Center $100,000 to help with its kitchen and dining hall renovations. The cost of the renovations at the center totaled $1.4 million. The newly renovated building permits the center to increase the number of people served. In 2003, the center helped 520 homeless individuals a month and served 33,000 individual hot meals.
On Nov. 12 the foundation trustees and eighth-grade students from Fall Creek Valley Middle School worked together serving the evening meal. Students from there are involved nine-months-a-year learning skills of meal preparation, collecting clothing and interacting across cultural and generational barriers.
Donations accepted
Fletcher Place Community Center continues to accept donation for its capital campaign. $300,000 is needed to fully pay for the newly rehabbed building. Fletcher Place is a conference Advance Special "Breaking the Cycle of Poverty through the Compassion of Jesus Christ." For more information about the center, log on to: www.fletcherplacecc.org or call 317-636-3466. Come visit at: Fletcher Place Community Center., 1637 E. Prospect St., Indianapolis, IN 46203.
Jan Jett serves as a South Indiana Conference Diaconal Minister, spiritual director, retreat leader and free lance writer.
Last updated on 25 Apr 2008