12/02/2006

Record-Eagle/Douglas Tesner
Steven Wade, lay ministry coordinator, and volunteers Diane Bosch and Linda Schubert get items ready to be stocked at Jubilee House.

Haven For The Homeless

Jubilee House opens in downtown Traverse City

By Gretchen Murray
Local columnist

Like the family album, houses hold the stories of the people that live in them, but sometimes a house has a story all its own.

It's that way with the little white house at 325 S. Washington in Traverse City. At more than 50 years old, it has played its own role in shaping community. Recently freshened by the hands of many volunteers, the pretty Victorian now enters a new phase of its life as it becomes Jubilee House, a community outreach to the homeless.

According to Lay Ministry Coordinator Steven Wade, Grace Episcopal Church bought the house along with two others in the 1950s, and it was spared in a demolition process back in the 1960s. Since then, the house has gone through a series of changes. Once a law office, a rectory for an associate pastor and home to one or two private families, the house also served as a halfway house for Alcohol Treatment Services.

The original Goodwill Inn got its start in the house. During the summer of 2004, it served as temporary church offices when a new building replaced the old church on the corner of Washington and Boardman.

"At the time we were doing the new construction, we knew we wanted to expand the ministries,” Wade said. "The vision from 2003 on was for this to become ministry space.”

Jubilee Ministries, within the Episcopal Church of the United States, extends the "Jubilee” designation to projects that exemplify the church's directive to reach out to those in need, Wade said.

To do that effectively, staff members and volunteers met with representatives from three social service agencies, the Goodwill Inn, Third Level Crisis Center and the Women's Resource Center to discuss the needs of the community.

Record-Eagle/Douglas Tesner
Greg Hagan, a volunteer, sets up a computer system at the Jubilee House. Grace Episcopal Church is opening Jubilee House as an outreach for area homeless to shower, wash clothes, write resumes, check e-mail and tend to other basics.

"We wanted to respond to an unmet need,” Wade said, adding that church board members also attended city council meetings asking for input and feedback from the onset.

The consensus was that the house would be a complement to the Safe Harbor initiative of several downtown churches, in which Grace Episcopal is a partner. The churches take turns providing nighttime emergency shelter to the homeless during winter months.

Jubilee House which opened its doors in September currently is staffed from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Thursdays and Fridays. It provides a homey atmosphere where people can shower and wash their clothes, even the ones they are wearing, thanks to a supply of scrubs donated by Munson Hospital and kept handy for changing in to while clothes cycle through the laundry.

The house also serves as a personal communication center for those with limited personal resources by offering the use of phones and computers for resume development and job searching and as a way to send and receive e-mail.

"We also have a voice mailbox system so that, if our patrons want to put in job applications and they have to answer the question, 'How can we reach you?' they will give a pin number similar to an extension number. There's dignity and privacy in that,” Wade said. Patrons may receive mail at the house and communicate with others through the Jubilee House message board.

"There is no criteria to use the services at Jubilee House and there never will be,” he said. "Just as there is no criteria to use the church's food pantry or the Friday lunch.”

He is adamant that the house will keep its homey atmosphere. To eliminate an institutional feel, rules are not posted, however those using the facility will have to enter into an agreement that is pretty simple — respect others, and no smoking, drugs or alcohol use. It may look like home, but the house is not an overnight shelter. However it will be a resource for those needing additional aid. Lists of resources are updated by volunteers who willingly connect patrons with a help database through Third Level and refer them to the logbook for information on Safe Harbor, daily community meals, social service agencies, family services and veterans affairs.

Since its opening, the capabilities of Jubilee House have been spreading by word of mouth.

"We wanted to start small and slow,” Ward said. "We needed the practical experience, but we're prepared to throttle up as winter approaches. We expect to have hundreds of fliers in people's hands very soon.”

Church committees have been backing the operation through planning and implementation networks involving some 30 people. In addition, others have donated household items, replaced carpeting and worked on cleaning crews.

"It's taken hundreds of hours to bring the concept into reality,” said Greg Hagan, the church's senior warden and president of the church board.

Even with the endorsement of the national church, Grace has received no grants or outside funding for the project. Wade said the maintenance, supplies, utilities, cleaning and insurance all have been absorbed by the congregation.

In spite of their time and effort, church members want Jubilee House to stand as its own entity. The only time the church is mentioned in the brochures is as a landmark reference to the house's location — the express wish of the congregation.

"This is not Grace Episcopal doing something for our own benefit. We're not out to convert people to Christianity or the Episcopal Church,” Wade said. "We want to minister to people where they are. We want people to know that they are not walking into an evangelical center. There's no hook, no indoctrination.

"When we were planning to build the new church, we thought about moving out of town, but the congregation wanted to stay downtown because they felt the church was a recognizable place and because we're a downtown church,” Hagan said. "We're part of an ongoing ministry we've been involved with for decades, and we wanted to enhance the level of outreach that has always been there.”

Jubilee House will be open for tours from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. Dec. 9 at 325 Washington St. For details, call 947-2330.