After serving the community for more than 20 years, the Mission of Hope in Hardy is faced with two options, moving or closing their doors.
“We had a series of meetings recently with the owner of the building and the bottom line is, he wants to use it for another purpose, and we need to be out by the end of the year,” Administrator Julia Baldridge said. “It is his building, and he should be able to do what he wants with his property, but it does mean, we have to do something different.”
Since its inception more than two decades ago, the Mission of Hope has helped cloth, house, feed and furnish those in need.
The number of those in need skyrocketed during the pandemic. As inflation rose, making ends meet became a much more difficult task. Through the food pantries alone, the Mission helps provide food and security to hundreds of families weekly. During the last 20 years, it is not a stretch to list the number of individuals served in the hundreds of thousands.
“The numbers vary, but on average especially right now, we provide food to a little over 350 families each month, and many more with clothing and furniture and we want to be able to continue to serve this community. We are looking at options, but we need a large space to house the donations, run the store which helps keep us operating and a place for the freezers and food we provide to the people in need who come to us,” Baldridge said.
Baldridge said the organization is still reviewing options, but as of May 24, is no longer accepting donations of clothing, furniture, dishes or other materials.
“Because we know we have to make a change, we cannot accept any more items right now. This is a very large operation, and it will take hundreds of hours to prepare for whatever the next step is,” Baldridge said. “We will continue to operate the store, provide food during distribution and when the time comes or we have found a solution, we will keep the community informed. If we are able, we want to continue to serve, but we want to thank the community for their support all these years and their continued support.”
If you would like to help support the Mission in their efforts to continue operations, you may make a monetary donation in person or by visiting Hardymission.com.
Lauren is a an award-winning journalist who decided after 10 years of newspaper experience to venture out. Hallmark Times was born.
