Hello and Happy New Year from your new Executive Director. Unfortunately, due to the pandemic, I have not gotten a formal opportunity to meet all of you. Thankfully, through volunteer work in the past and being a member of the community, I know many of you and am blessed to call several of you friends.
I’m sending this message today to reflect with you on this historic year. It has tested us in ways few of us could have imagined. Probably like you, there were many moments of sadness, anger, and unknown as we journeyed through 2020. And while it’s clear the pandemic still has a grasp on our country, I am trying to find hope in the great blessings that are still around us. This hope comes from each and every one of you that are a part of the Community of Hope family. Through this pandemic, you have delivered meals, donated, volunteered, and continued to serve your community in remarkable ways, all which were required to keep our doors open 24 hours a day since March. We look forward to the days when we can ‘open our doors’ to any who need a warm place to stay during the day and to release the ‘head to toe’ sleeping. Until then we hold on to hope that each day we show up, we are contributing to the lives of the most vulnerable in our community.
The second purpose of this message is to update you on where we are. Call it a state of the union address.
Let me start by saying that I am humbled to be sending this message to you. As your new Executive Director, I am honored at this opportunity to ‘carry the torch’ forward. To those whom I haven’t had the opportunity to meet, let me introduce myself. I join the Leavenworth Interfaith Community of Hope after a 14-year tenure at Leavenworth USD453, our local school district with a diverse employee body of over 700 employees. As the Assistant Director of Human Resources, I provided full-service HR support to district employees. My main areas of expertise include employment law, compliance, licensing, evaluations, contracts, and mandated training. I joined the Leavenworth community in April 2007. I hold a Bachelor of Science degree in Management and Human Resources from Park University, and a Master of Business Administration degree from Webster University.
Passionate about sports and music, I am an avid Kansas City Chiefs, Royals, and Kansas Jayhawk supporter (yes, even football). When I’m not at work, my family and I are probably out on an adventure. Although I’m a sucker for a lazy day at home, we fill our days with hikes, traveling, being in the community, at Worlds of Fun, a sporting event, or anything else outside and with friends. My husband, Ryan, is a Worship Leader at Westside Leavenworth, and my two sweet girls, ages 10 and 6, are students at David Brewer Elementary. When I do get a moment to myself, you can typically find me at a coffee shop reading a book, visiting with a good friend, or serving at the Leavenworth Interfaith Community of Hope.
I began unofficially in December and have learned so much. I hope to continue to add to the vibrant culture that has been created, and build on the successes that the last 6 years have brought. I will have a high focus on a strong volunteer pool. I strongly believe that ‘many hands make light work.’ We completely understand that COVID was unforeseen and created a lot of roadblocks for our volunteers. We look forward to the day when each and every one of our beloved volunteers can return to their positions. Each one of us serves a very important role to the body, and we look forward to that being whole once again. I also have a strong passion for the services that we offer not only to the community but those guests staying at our Day Center and Night Shelter. We will continue to partner with the City of Leavenworth, Leavenworth County, and other organizations in our community to increase the impact we can have on those who look to us for support.
I would be remiss if I did not mention Sister Vickie and the big shoes I have to fill. After years of dedication to the Community of Hope employees, volunteers, guests, and donors, she leaves a career and organization to be proud of. We are thankful for her years of service, and will always hold her in a special place as the Founder of the Leavenworth Interfaith Community of Hope. Although we may not see her face on a daily basis, she will always be a part of our family and we hope to always have her thumbprint as part of our DNA moving forward. We wish her well in her future endeavors, and hope we can celebrate her big in post-COVID days (stay tuned for a Save the Date coming soon).
When I state I have ‘big shoes to fill’ I believe each of you know what I mean (although Sister Vickie says her shoe size is only a 6 :). We have lost a few amazing teammates and I am passionate about building that back up and having a strong, diverse and dynamic staff. We have been able to replace the open positions and I am excited to move into 2021. We have hired Stephen Walker for the Welcome Central Director position, which was open due to Felicia Bagly’s recent resignation. Stephen joined us a few days a week through the end of the year as he transitioned out of his current position, and joined us on a full-time basis on January 4. Stephen completed his studies at Rhema Bible College and currently serves alongside his dad, Pastor David Walker, at Harvest Christian Center International (HCCI). He comes to us with a background in ministry, sales, and customer service. He has experience in community service and working with the public. We're excited for all Stephen will bring to our already dynamic team! The next addition is Belinda Klassen, who will come on board as the Office Manager on January 18. This position will replace the glorious Linda Martin; however, their duties will be different. Belinda moved to the Leavenworth community a year ago with her husband and 3 children. She has experience as a District Office Receptionist and Office Manager, as well as a unique background in Community Living with individuals with special needs. We are very grateful for those remaining on our team, who will help us move forward with the history and culture that has been established for the last several years.
Other highlights from our programs:
- The Day Center is still limited to 12 guests. At least 1/2 of those guests have been consistent throughout the pandemic. Since operating 24 hours a day in March, guests in the day shelter get breakfast, lunch, and dinner all served to them. Guests, along with employees and volunteers, clean from 2-3PM and have been fairly helpful with chores around the facility. Paula and Sister Pat are our Directors of the Day Center and do an amazing job with cooking, cleaning, scheduling showers and laundry for guests and more. There were many days where they were serving over 100 meals at lunch which is a lot of work in an hours time. As the days get colder, those numbers have been trending a little closer to the 40-50 rang.
- You probably have already seen on social media, but we did open a second location, just across the street from the current Community of Hope building. The ‘Satellite Campus’ is in the basement of the Leavenworth Tabernacle building. Thanks to a partnership between the church, the city, and our organization, that location can house up to 20 guests from 6:30AM-8:30PM. Bill Criss, who also works as the Intake Coordinator at the Night Shelter, is heading that program as the Satellite Campus Supervisor, and has three other amazing staff members who help support that program. Like all new programs, we have hit some roadblocks and are learning a lot, but are thankful that those who would not have had a warm, safe place to go during the freezing temp days, have a location that is part of our community.
- The Night Shelter trends are still unpredictable and, although the last 2 weeks have increased, we averaged 19 guests per night in the month of December. There has not been a night in 2020 that we have had to turn someone away because we are too full. We can house up to 27 in our current state, and if we need to get creative on super cold nights, we could potentially get up to 33 beds safely and securely in our facility. Peg is our faithful leader and is joined by 4 other employees to support the evening intake, and morning outtake, processes. The biggest challenge right now is the amount of time it takes to get guests out of the Day Center with our COVID processes. Did I mention we can’t wait for COVID to be over? :) Many of you who are receiving this email are the reason our Night Shelter is so successful. It takes 70 individuals (or positions) in order to run the program, and since opening many years ago, the Community of Hope team has always been able to do that. This is a huge success that we should continue to celebrate.
- Since the pandemic began, Welcome Central has had a huge increase in requests for financial support. Most of those come by way of rental and utility assistant requests. If they are requesting assistance that we do not provide, we’re working on a database and information that we can quickly share with them to get them connected to the right resources. Stephen and the team of volunteers (which are instrumental to the success of that program) don’t stop working with clients from the time they start at 9AM until the last person is taken at 2PM. We were blessed in 2020 to get several COVID grants which came via the City of Leavenworth, and additionally have several that have been awarded to us in 2021. These grants allow us to help more individuals with assistance.
The last piece I’ll share is our needs. We continue to need volunteers, especially at our Night Shelter. As I stated above, we truly look forward to the day that our amazing volunteers can return safely. In the meantime, we are searching for new volunteers to join our team. Our next two volunteer trainings are Wednesday, January 13 and Monday, February 8. These events can always be found on our Facebook page. Please help us by share with your friends, family, or church members. Other areas we are connecting our community with our needs is by our new Meal Train where individuals can sign up to bring casseroles to help feed lunch to our community, and our Amazon WishList which lists both frequent used items and ‘dream/want’ items. As we work to communicate more with our volunteers and patrons, we will continue to keep these items updated in order to make it easy to partner with us.
Thank you for hanging with me through a long, informative email! From all of us at the Community of Hope, thank you for all you have done and continue to do to make the world a better place. Thank you for being part of our family. Have a safe, happy, and healthy new year.
Myranda Agnew
Executive Director
Leavenworth Interfaith Community of Hope
(913) 306-5264
Myranda.Agnew@lvcommunityofhope.org
