A place for people in need to have access to free laundry, showers, meals, and a safe place just to belong was something the Rolla Community lacked. With the closest homeless shelter 100 miles away, The Vineyard church saw this hole in the community and decided to take action. The Mission is a charity in the heart of Rolla, Missouri providing the less fortunate people in the community a safe space and providing many resources they otherwise wouldn’t have. Marie Allen, one of the many people in charge of running The Mission, shares some insight on how this charity became what it is now.

“Vineyard church moved into this building in about 2004 after a fire in another facility. Our pastor was really interested in figuring out a way to use this space to help the community that was unique, that wasn’t something someone else was doing. So, somehow, some creative way, he came up with the idea for a free laundromat and in 2009, the laundry room opened. At first, that was all The Mission was, just free laundry, because that’s something that can be really expensive for families that don’t have access to a washer or dryer. So, that was a big deal for people to be able to come in and wash their clothes. We would open up a couple of days a week to the community and people would hear about it or call and that’s how it started. In about 2012 we had a college-aged man in the church [who] asked if he could open the laundry room on a day that it wasn’t normally open; he wanted to cook lunch for the people that came. So, he came and did that for several years just out of his own pocket, just out of his heart to help take care of people. He called it ‘Lunch and Laundry,’ and that when on for several years after that. Then, 2014 is when The Mission opened. We saw more and more people start to come and we recognized that there was just really a lot of need in the community for more than what we currently were providing. So in 2014 we decided to incorporate The Mission as its own charity. We separated it out from the church, made its own. It’s called a 5C301 charity, which means it’s tax exempted, it’s not a part of the church, it’s just a charity to help the poor. And we’ve continued to grow and increase our hours and increase our services. In one week currently, about 150 loads of laundry get done here. We have probably about 25 showers [taken a week] give or take, and then right around 325 individual meals. I would say in a typical day, there’s between 40 and 50 people that come through here and access one or more services. We just do the best we can to serve whoever comes through the door, and as it grows, we’ll just try to grow with it,” Allen said.

Funding is always a big part of every charity. Luckily, The Mission has many people and organizations that are more than happy to help out.

“The church has continued to support The Mission by not charging rent or utilities at this point and then the food and cash to supplement come from donations from the community. We have individuals that give to us financially, and we have a couple of local connections for actual food. A lot of our meals come from Grace and one of the local grocery stores that wants to stay anonymous brings quite a bit of meat so that I haven’t really had to spend that much cash money a week on what we’re doing; because a lot of the things we have on our shelves are donated. And of course, this year the big car dealerships, Sakelaris, Ford, and Fairground Chevrolet, did a couple of food drives and they shared some of what they collected with us. Then just random people will come in and say ‘Oh, I was driving by and I think you help people so can you use two bags of groceries’ or ‘Here’s some shampoo, I picked up a couple of extra bottles,’” Allen said.

Just like most charities in the local community, The Mission relies on volunteers and their hearts to help others to keep the place running smoothly.

“We are completely 100% volunteer run. My husband serves as the executive director and he and I both work full time jobs at other places and keep up with what’s going on here, [so] we couldn’t do that without the regular weekly volunteers we have here. We have about 22 to 24 people that come in each week and do different things. Some people just come in to make coffee in the morning and some people will actually cook the meals. There’s also a volunteer application on the website but it’s really pretty simple. My process is to just get to know people and have them kind of shadow me or another of our regular volunteers to find out what their interests are and what their skills are and what they’re interested in doing,” Allen said.

Along with regular volunteers, Allen is more than happy to find help for any high schoolers looking for volunteer hours.

“We have lots and lots of things a high schooler could do to help. We always need extra pairs of hands to help with meal prep or cleaning or even just to come and hangout and be with people because that’s really what we’ve created, a safe place to belong so people can just come and hangout. Even if they don’t need to laundry or if they don’t need a shower, we have lots of people come in everyday just because their friends are here and it’s become kind of a little community. So just hanging out with people is an important thing to do. If somebody wanted to serve, I’m sure I can find them a place to help,” Allen said.

Spreading the word of a place like The Mission to everyone in need is a major part on how The Mission gets all of the visitors that they do.

“We do have a Facebook page that people can follow and then our website. There are also many agencies that do a lot for people who are in crisis and so we try to make sure they know about what we do so that when someone comes to them, they can refer them to here. So the police office knows about us, the hospital knows about us, pathways knows about us, and Grace knows about us so that way, word of mouth from other agencies gets people into our building,” Allen said.

With all of the services that The Mission already provides, Allen felt like they needed to fill yet another gap in the community as the weather got colder.

“I’m really excited that actually this winter, we have been able to stay open overnight. We don’t have beds, but people during the day will take naps on the sofa or the recliners, so we just communicated with the city and found out what all of the regulations were but we just open over night and people come in to crash on the couch. Three to five people have spent the night each night since December 12. We knew that some of the people that we were serving regularly were living in cars or some people were actually camping out in the woods and as it got colder and colder, it’s just really upsetting to think about people you care about and you see day in and day out to know that they’re out there and they’re not safe. So, it was kind of a huge step organizationally to do this but it’s worked out, really well and we have that staffed every night and people will come and spend the night incase of emergencies. It’s been an incredible experience to be able to provide for them because there’s no open shelter. We have the Russell House for domestic violence victims, but that’s limited to women and children. [There’s] nothing like a shelter for 100 miles. So, to have some place where someone can just come in out of the cold, I’m just really thankful we were able to do that this winter,” Allen said.

As for this upcoming year, Allen has multiple new big plans for The Mission.

“This year one of our big goals is to increase our fundraising. We’ve recently signed a contract with a freelance grant writer so grant money comes from private foundations and some from the government and it’s funding that comes from places other than just individuals that would help us to do more to help more of the community. So, fundraising and pursuing other streams of income for us would allow us to see what the next step looks like for The Mission [as well as doing] what we’re doing now and making it better. We’re looking to increase our volunteer base as well because we’re stretched pretty thin even with the wonderful crew we have now. So, we’re looking for extra pairs of hands and more money to do what we’re doing just doing it even better,” Allen said.