Like most non profit organizations. Catholic Charities operates on a fiscal year – July 1 to June 30. This means that every year, July 1st is New Year’s Day for us! It’s the time that new budgets are in place, annual plans become active and data collection about services provided and outcomes achieved begins anew.
Each July 1st feels like a new beginning, but 2024 has a special sparkle to it. This year, we’ll complete renovations of the former St. Matthew Church and it will fully open as the Serve and Lift Center. Food pantry services will take on a new look, as clients will now be afforded a shopping experience and one-toone support from a volunteer or staff person as they make their choices. Our client centric service model of full intake meetings with a specialist and specific referrals to internal programs and supports will be more robust as staff from all our program areas will be housed at the Serve and Lift Center, and connecting clients to the appropriate case worker or specialist will be seamless.
This also means that opportunities to fulfill the mission of Catholic Charities will be much more available to donors and volunteers. The new location affords the space for dozens of volunteers to assist with sorting and inventorying food donations. It provides opportunities for directly assisting clients as they make their food choices in the pantry. Employment services like resume review or job interview prep will need more and more volunteers to sit with men and women who are seeking jobs – often for the first time in years – and prepare them to present their best selves to prospective employers -and then celebrate with them when a job offer is extended.
This new year, more than any other of our 145 years of service, invites you to be part of serving and lifting our neighbors in need. Your volunteer time weekly can change the trajectory of someone’s life. Your monthly donation to support the food pantry can keep children from going to bed hungry. Your presence at the Center is truly a sign of God among His people.
Come celebrate the new year with us!
By Susan Walker, Executive Director of Outreach and Engagement at Catholic Charities of Kansas City–St. Joseph