Christian Love Fellowship Ministries International
1601 Stamford Blvd, Ypsilanti MI. 48198
Our Community Issues:
Our Church is located in Superior Township which is in Ypsilanti. We are located in a low socio-economic community surrounded by subdivisions with a mixed range of family income. The school district that surrounds our community was consolidated several years ago with the Ypsilanti Community School district leaving only two schools in our community. Both elementary schools are considered low performing based on state measures.
We have a very small recreational department without a facility to conduct programming. The community has limited playgrounds that attract children and no programming that will attract older teens and families.
My wife and I decided to start running summer programs that would provide our local community with activities that would engage our children and families. Our very first program started 10 years ago in collaboration with the Washtenaw County Sheriff Office and Community Engagement division.
Ballin on the Blvd 3on3 Community basketball tournament:
This program is a free 3 on 3 basketball tournament for all ages. It’s a 6-week program that allows girls and boys 13 and under and 14 and up to compete in a once a week basketball tournament for gift cards, trophies, basketballs, and t-shirts. The Washtenaw County Sheriff Deputies and Fire Department also participate in the program with the kids. During this program we also partner with
All Things Artistic Ministries Inc.
to do take home arts and craft projects for the 6-weeks. Food Gatherers provided hot meals, and the Book Club which during the program reads stories to kids and pass out books for them to keep.
Community Food Distribution Program:
This program allows us to partner with Food Gatherers in order to distribute free groceries to all the families that reside in the local housing community every 4
th
Saturday. We were able to pass out over 60,000 pounds of food in 2019.
Common Ground Community Picnic:
This program is going into it’s 4
th
year summer of 2020. It’s focus is bringing the entire community together for one big picnic with bounce houses, backpacks, petting zoo that’s totally free for youth and families to enjoy and meet their neighbors. Year 1 we had approximately 200 youth and families attend and we gave out about 168 backpacks filled with school supplies. Year 2 we had approximately 300 plus attend and we were able to double our backpack giveaways. In Year 3 we partnered with the Washtenaw County Sheriff Office and made the event twice it’s size and we were able to serve over 650 people. August 2020 will be our 5
th
annual Community Picnic with hopes of growing it to be even bigger.
Gifts of Love Christmas Program:
This free program is going into its 3
rd
year. This program was created to ensure that children and families would have toys for their children ages 1yr-12yr old. We were able to partner with Toys-4-Tots to make sure children were able to enjoy Christmas. This past Christmas we were able to supply over 400 children with bags filled with toys.
Soaring Scholars Academic Tutoring Program:
This is our after school tutoring program at Holmes Elementary School in our community. We adopted this school over 4yrs ago in an attempt to assist in improving the academic learning environment. Over the course of 4 years we have made some significant improvements in some students, but we have created an environment were the students love to learn and we have made learning fun for them. Students attend 2 days a week after school. The program is respected by the teachers and they assist from time to time whenever they can.
These are just a few of our attempts at addressing some of the major issues we have recognized in our community. There is so much more that we as a Church body can do, but our resources are limited.
Some of the needs that we feel would assist even more are as follows:
·
Purchase of one or two 15-passenger vans that would allow us to pickup youth and families for events and programming. It would also allow us to transport children outside of their perspective neighborhoods for fieldtrips. We could better assist seniors and disabled residents in getting to Church for service and programs.
·
We would love to start a job training course in partnership with our local County Michigan Works program. We would need at least 20 chrome books and a mobile charging port.
·
The ability to supply 3 of our rooms with large screen TV’s for teaching classes and meetings.
·
We are looking to improve our kitchen to becoming a licensed commercial kitchen so that we can feed larger quantities of youth and families without having to pay for catering.
Pastor Harold and Angela Wimberly
