‘Hope grows here.’ Here’s what the new Community Outreach Center in Blackfoot could mean to area
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BLACKFOOT—A building currently serving as a food pantry is expected to expand to include more community services.
Jackie Young, president of the Community Dinner Table (CDT), and Jacque Burt, president of the Idaho Foster and Adoptive Parent Association (IDFAPA), announced the new Bingham Community Outreach Center on Wednesday. The CDT plans to purchase the 250 West Judicial Street building in Blackfoot, which currently partially operates as a food pantry, for $1 million to become the new center.
“There are a lot of people who helped us get where we are and a lot of people who are going to help us raise $1 million in the next six months,” said Lee Hammett, co-founder of CDT. “This pantry was built in 2014 in 54 days by volunteers. When we built it, we had no ownership, but we’ve made this commitment to the community, and the community is paying us back in spades.”
Young said the CDT has until the end of the year to buy the building, but their goal is to accomplish it in the next six months.
Among other things, it will be a larger donation center for The Village of Southeast Idaho. The Village is a foster care closet that provides clothes, goods, and toys to fostered youth on their first day of being removed from their home. It covers 16 counties across the region. IDFAPA is the nonprofit that runs The Village.
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“The Village plans to be moving in February,” Young said. “The pantry already operates, and we have a committee formed to discuss ideas for the middle part of the building.”
The middle of the building, currently storing office supplies and metal racks from the recently vacated Kirkham Auto Parts, has potential to include a soup kitchen, counseling for youth and community education programs, Young said.
“That’s a conceptual idea right now, so we don’t want to commit to exactly what we’ll be doing,” she said. “We’ve had a lot of different ideas, but we’re going to start with the education portion first and get that completely open.”
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Young has been busy writing and coordinating grants with the city and hospitals to raise money. She said Bingham Ag Services matched a dollar-for-dollar amount of $25,000 for its annual harvest fundraiser (a total of $50,000 from that event).
The CDT and IDFAPA websites contain information on how to donate toward the purchase of the Bingham Community Outreach Center, and at Wednesday’s news conference, Young asked the community to be advocates and stewards for reaching this goal.
“We love the food donations. We love our ranchers and farmers who donate potatoes to us every year and beef. We have amazing food drives,” Young said. “Now we’re going to do drives for Jacque at The Village. We want to work together.”
Heather and Jerry Gwynn from Just Serve, an outreach organization sponsored by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, were in attendance and helping to organize volunteers for the initiative.
“Part of the interfaith work being done here is honoring the greatest commandment of ‘love thy neighbor,’” Heather Gwynn said.
Burt’s office would be included in the new outreach center and would be the hub for all of IDFAPA across the state. Emilee England, director for The Village, would also be overseeing the transition from their current 1,700-square-foot building to the new 12,000-square-foot location. All the organizations involved are run 100 percent by donations and volunteers.
The current location of The Village at 35 East Pacific Street will remain open until the transition is complete.
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“Hope grows here,” Burt said. “And that’s what we’re going to do: build hope for these children. We will need volunteers, we will still need donations, and we need funds. We are fundraising to purchase this building. That’s our first goal.”
Young said that this next evolution of CDT, The Village, and “an entire city block dedicated to the community” doesn’t “come cheap.”
“It isn’t free, and it shouldn’t be free,” Young said. “But it shows our commitment to this community, and it shows the level of commitment that so many people have to reaching out and helping those in need.”
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