5Bringing Hope via. 6Pardon Our INSIDE:

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1 January 2015 Transforming Lives. Transforming Our City. PhoenixRescueMission.org Through the work of veteran Phoenix Police Detective Rusty Stewart, the homeless are coming to the Phoenix Rescue Mission s Police and Rescue Collaboration (P.A.R.C.) to get the help they need to start over. Read about it on page three. INSIDE: 2 The Main Thing 5Bringing Hope via the Hope Coach 6Pardon Our Dust!

2 keeping the main thing, themainthing a message from Jay Cory, President and CEO It s a brand new year! Here at the Phoenix Rescue Mission God has given us a brand new vision for bringing transformation in more ways than ever before to our homeless friends! It begins with gearing up exciting new programs like Project P.A.R.C. Bench (cover). This is a fantastic new opportunity to work closely with our court system, Human Services and Phoenix Law enforcement divisions to give those out on the streets a path towards hope rather than prosecution. God is taking the life-changing power of the Mission and using it in a new way - as a tool in the hands of our men and women in blue. It continues through the current expansion of our men s emergency shelter services location (page 6). Thanks to the generous support of friends like you, we ve upgraded our well-worn restroom facilities, adding 8 new showers and paving the way for the addition of women s shelter services in the future. We re knocking down walls and adding square footage to our overnight guest area making even more beds available for those who seek nightly the warmth and safety that comes from staying at the Mission. Rick Cohen, PRM Board Ambassador and Renovation General Contractor (left) and Dan God continues to open up new avenues of transformation even Starkey, Renovation Foreman (right) join PRM President Jay Cory in a pipe cutting ceremony where we weren t looking for it! prior to construction of the new shower and restroom facilities. With the remodel of the Mission also came the discovery that there were many areas that could support the addition of a second floor. This new space will allow us more office space to expand our already stretched administrative staff giving us the ability to provide even more life-changing services to the men, women and children we serve. In short, 2015 will be an exciting year for the Mission and for those we serve but we couldn t do any of it without the prayers and support of friends like you. Thank you for making all of this possible and literally changing the fate, both temporally and eternally, for thousands of homeless here in Phoenix every year! One more thing. I ve got an exciting new announcement next month that I can t wait to share with you. It will change the way you see the Phoenix Rescue Mission. Please look forward to our February Newsletter for more information! Till then, Happy New Year and God Bless!

3 It s not a crime to be Homeless. Actually, it may surprise you to learn that in the city of Phoenix, it is. They re called quality of life crimes. Loitering, trespassing, and sleeping in a public park can quickly get someone out on the streets a ride in the back of a police cruiser. But it turns out that a combination of arrests, jail time and mounting fines do very little to encourage life change for the homeless. Rusty Stewart, a veteran detective in the Phoenix Police Department, recognized this fact in early 2005 and decided to break the cycle an assignment that would eventually lead him to the Phoenix Rescue Mission. We used to drive circles around the homeless to get them to move along we don t do that anymore. Now when an officer stops a homeless person on the streets, instead of putting them behind bars they can instead offer them a better option a chance to find hope at the Phoenix Rescue Mission. After eight long years battling to change internal procedures for confronting the growing homeless population, Rusty finally succeeded in creating the Misdemeanor Repeat Offender Program or MROP. Now when an officer stops a homeless person on the streets, instead of putting them behind bars they can instead offer them a better option a chance to find hope at the Phoenix Rescue Mission. It s not a choice anymore to go back to sleeping in the alley or panhandling in the parking lot. They now have the choice to move forward. Rusty explains, They either find a hot meal at the Mission or enhanced prosecution downtown. Now it s up to them. The goal is to get men off the streets as quickly as we can and fortunately, the Phoenix Rescue Mission supplies us with a positive way to do that. Once they arrive at the Mission via our Hope Coach, it s Project Coordinator Nathan Smith s responsibility to make sure they get what they need to start over. He does that through a brand new program he s designed and operates here at the Mission called Project P.A.R.C. Bench. P.A.R.C. stands for Police And Rescue Collaboration explains Nathan, Once men and 3

4 women arrive through MROP we provide them with a space where they can immediately connect to a case worker. From that point on they can gain access to basic care such as medical and vision care, and assistance in finding permanent housing. If job skills and employment are what is needed to permanently move them from the street, they can stay in the shelter and complete our job attainment shelter module. If they struggle with an addiction, we can point them toward our Christ-centered recovery program. Even though we are still in the early stages of Project P.A.R.C. Bench, we are already seeing about 15 positive outcomes per month! That s a number that Rusty promises will grow with time as his MROP program spreads to precincts across Phoenix. Once I get the other officers trained in doing this the right way there will be quite the flow of men coming to the Mission via MROP. We re still feeling this out and refining the rules but I ve been very happy with the way the Mission has worked with us. They totally understand the goal and are committed 100 percent. This is just another way the partnership of friends like you is changing our community. Thanks to this beautiful collaboration, it s a new day out on the streets of our city for those in need of hope. More homeless and hurting than ever before will find an opportunity at transformation thanks to officers like Rusty Stewart and the prayers and support of friends like you. Thank you! Nathan Smith (left) with Jordan Hunter, Phoenix Rescue Mission client who has been clean for eight months and enrolled in our Transformation Recovery Program. 4

5 Before we set out for the day, Steve, our videographer for the day, asked me What do I expect to happen on the Hope Coach today? Because this was my first time, I didn t know what to say. To bring hope to people, I replied, with no real idea of what to expect. Then we hit the road. At our first stop we found a young, downcast woman coming out of a gas station convenience store carrying a large duffle bag. Cliff, the driver of the Hope Coach, asks out of the driver side window, Are you ok? Do you have a plan? Her name is Tracey and looking down at her feet she honestly answers, No. It s obvious Tracey is suffering from some sort of drug and alcohol induced haze. At first she s reluctant to let anyone touch her, but by the end of the encounter Tracey gives in and allows us to pray Hope Coach Chaplain over her. She walks Cliff Danley offers help to away with a few bottles a woman in need. of water, her Big Gulp cocktail and the knowledge of where to call if she decides she wants help with finding her way. At our next few stops we meet many wandering souls like Jason, who lives with his friends on the side of a vacant office complex among old shopping carts, dirty blankets and other material chaos. We meet Mary who was recently kicked out by her boyfriend and Nelly who could not leave her best friend out on the streets alone. At one point Cliff calls me over to pray for a woman named Nicole. She wants a place to go. I m reminded of the immense need for a Christcentered women s shelter. Amidst their tears, they all receive water, food and prayer. That s when we visit our last stop - the biggest party hotel in the Valley. Cliff tells us there are a lot of prostitutes and drugs here. To our surprise we immediately recognize Tracey from this morning. She sees us and quickly books it out of the area. Sadly, the encounter brings to mind Jesus question, Do you want to be well? For the time being, it appears Tracey s answer to that question is No. At the hotel we meet all kinds of people, pass out food and water and load back into the van. Then it s my turn to ask Steve a question of my own. I ask him what he s feeling right now. Because we all spent the day planting seeds of hope and life, his answer speaks for all of us. High, he says. A Holy Ghost high! We ve all bonded in these few profound hours on the Hope Coach. Each sharing our own testimonies and a few laughs along with the sack lunches, water and socks. We journeyed out today willing to let God do what he wanted. Through this amazing work, He reminded us of His love and unrelenting desire for each and every human being to receive the life for which Christ died. It was an eye-opening experience and certainly one that I ll never forget! Scan the code at right to see a video of Nikki s day on the Hope Coach. 5

6 SHOWERS - BEFORE Thanks to our generous friends, our Men s Emergency Shelter is getting a long-overdue overhaul! For the past few months, the Mission has undergone heavy construction in order to reach more lives than ever before. We ve knocked down walls, expanded our square footage and are making long over-due improvements to facilities we ve relied on for over 20 years! As you can see, things are coming along nicely, our bathroom renovation is complete and the second floor is beginning to come together. There is a lot left to do but we wanted to give you a quick update and show you what answered prayers look like! Soon we ll be able to serve more men, women and children at one time than we ever have before and we have you, our kingdom partners to thank for it! Thank you for helping make 2014 a resounding success and preparing the way for an even more amazing 2015! If you would like to take a tour or learn more about construction funding opportunities, please prm@phoenixrescuemission.org or call Broken, missing tile and mold were the result of hundreds of thousands of showers over 20 years. SHOWERS - AFTER Eight additional shower and bathroom stalls, handicap accessible, are now complete. SECOND FLOOR EXPANSION Adding a second floor at the shelter gives us an additional 12,000 sq. ft. for more men s programs. Phoenix Rescue Mission would like to thank you for a tremendous year. As you can see, your support really made a difference for men, women and children in the Phoenix area: (Figures from July 1, June 30, 2014) Mission Mileposts Total Meals Provided 386,435 Bed Nights of Shelter 79,456 Permanent Job Placements 104 Volunteer Service Hours 27,949 Bottles of Water Distributed 468,258 To mail a gift: P.O. Box 6708 ~ Phoenix, AZ For shelter & meal service: 1801 S. 35th Avenue ~ Phoenix, AZ ~