Why is the Jesus Center moving?
In 2016, the Jesus Center identified a host of challenges related to our building at 1297 Park Avenue that kept us from adapting programs to the growing needs of our participants. Built nearly 120 years ago, our building was simply not designed for its current use. Our organization has struggled with issues of access, safety, and its position on the lot. Candidly, the issues facing those without homes are more complex now than when we moved to Park Avenue over 20 years ago. We need to think differently and strategically about how to address needs of the homeless more comprehensively as a community – focusing our programs and co-locating critical services to insure that more folks can move from suffering to stable housing and an abundant life.
Where are you moving to?
The Jesus Center will move to 2255 Fair Street just south of the Silver Dollar Fairgrounds, in the Spring of 2021. The property has been owned and operated by the Work Training Center (WTC) for over 40 years offering hope and new life to adults with disabilities through work training. The WTC needs have changed, and this 6-acre property was being underutilized. This sale offered WTC an opportunity to relocate their programs and offices in new space throughout several locations in Chico. Don Krysakowski, Executive Director of the Work Training Center, has noted that both he and the board members of WTC are excited about the opportunity that this sale brings to their organization and the people they serve.
“Ms. Cootsona’s inquiry came at a great time and fit within our long-term strategic vision of becoming a more nimble and agile agency. Obviously, we are always focused on getting our clients more engaged, respected, understood, volunteering and working in our community. So much of what we do now and in the future will no longer depend on having a physical building for our people.”
What will happen to the Jesus Center’s property at 1297 Park Avenue?
Jamboree Housing Corporation has purchased our property on Park Avenue to build 59 units of affordable housing. For more information, please consult Jamboree’s website.
What is the Renewal Center?
The Renewal Center is a multi-agency campus where services will be co-located allowing our shared participants to access several services at once and allow the providers to fill gaps currently unaddressed. This concept became branded as the Renewal Center, a place where help is being redefined, hope is restored, and lives renewed. The Renewal Center will be developed on the west side of the Fair Street property. Construction is due to begin in Summer 2021.
Is the Jesus Center changing its name?
The Jesus Center will maintain its name, identity, and core programs on the east side of Fair Street while concurrently developing and hosting the shared space called the Renewal Center on the west side. This separation will memorialize the Jesus Center’s approach and core values while simultaneously allowing for maximum collaboration amongst service providers.
Will the Jesus Center still be faith based?
The Jesus Center will maintain its core identity in Christ. We see ourselves as an outpost for the people of God to come and be the hands and feet of Jesus. No building or program will take the place of one on one relationships to express the love of God and the transforming love of Christ. The Jesus Center is founded in God’s love for all people. Our core value of being Christ Centered suggests that we follow Jesus’ example of honoring and valuing the poor and the outcast. We do our best to follow his example. We offer the love and salvation of Christ to those we serve; we do not force, coerce or require belief to receive services. We will not deviate from these beliefs or from our practices that honor each human.
What programs and services will be available at the new Jesus Center and the Renewal Center?
The Jesus Center will focus on substance-free sheltering by expanding Sabbath House. There will be 35 beds for women and 25 for men, totally 60 beds of shelter. The program will be comprehensive, 24-7, including a newly formed, trauma sensitive case management approach called Pathways. It will start with a focus on respite and stabilization, and then address purpose/vocation, health and wellness, and independence.
The Renewal Center will be collaborative by design. It will host County services including Butte County Behavioral Health, HHOME, and Department of Employment Social Services. It will also be the home of a medical facility hosted by Sierra Health and Wellness with the Elijah House Foundation. The Renewal Center will include 15 family shelter units, as well as shelter for specialized populations including a co-hosted back to work program, medical respite beds, Sabbath House West, recovery support, and several others. Job training and life skills development will be imbedded in all aspects of both the Renewal Center and the Jesus Center campus. It is part of the future vision to include Jamboree Housing Corporation with a multi-family permanent supportive housing community.
How will this improve the situation with the homeless and not just move the problem elsewhere, adversely impacting the community?
The Jesus Center and Renewal Center will focus on folks who are expressing a desire for change. Those who will utilize our sheltering or access rehabilitation, mental health, and wellness services will be also housed and or engaged in an active program on-site. Drop-in services of the Jesus Center are being redesigned into other agencies in the community. Our capabilities as a provider of food will be redirected to work with other agencies as their food needs emerge. This new focus will allow us to make our best contribution, and truly help those who are ready to move forward. We are absolutely in the business of changed lives and our programs will be aligned accordingly.
At the Renewal Center, we will collaboratively redefine what it means to help those who are struggling to regain hope, purpose, health, and well-being. Redefining help means working with those who are able, willing and eager to take a step forward. They need a community and professionals to come alongside them to help them take the hard steps as they move forward. Today’s challenges are much more complicated than before. What we were doing even a decade ago isn’t good enough anymore. Folks need wrap around services, professional help, and encouragement to move forward.
“If you build it, they will come” … is this valid?
Our collective response to homelessness has not substantially changed in the last decade. Yet homelessness is growing while the reasons for homelessness have expanded including those left homeless are as result of natural disasters and massive economic crisis. These problems are everywhere. Both the relocation of the Jesus Center and the development of the Renewal Center are focused on helping those people who are struggling get well and move towards their best life. Pooling our resources and our creativity is the best use of limited resources.
Building a set of services that work together, share data, coordinate, and are progressive gives our community creates to strongest opportunities to find a path to housing and wholeness. Services will be built to preserve each human’s dignity. When at all possible, the services will be reciprocal and those who get help will have an opportunity to give back.
Isn’t the answer to homelessness, permanent housing? Why would you spend the time and energy on shelters and other non-permanent housing interventions?
There are many interventions needed to move a person without shelter into stable housing. Our community partners: the Torres Shelter and Safe Space Winter Shelter are doing a great job of creating a safe, low barrier landing place to get people out of the elements. For many this will be enough to launch them into permanent housing and stabilization, while others may need more. The Jesus Center and the Renewal Center will focus on sheltering, wrap around wellness services and transitional housing in a recovery model. We are excited to witness our 1297 Park Avenue property be developed into 59 units of affordable housing. By linking arms with affordable housing specialists, we can ensure that our community is addressing the entire continuum of needed programs.
How do the other current Service Providers feel about this project?
From the very beginning of this project we have been committed to listening to and working with our colleagues within the service provider community. Although our site collaborators remain in the process of being finalized, we have included dozens of agencies in our planning for the last 3 years. We are grateful for the opportunity to work on this project with input from the City of Chico, Butte County Behavioral Health, Butte County Public Health, Department of Social Services, Enloe Medical Center, Ampla Health, Help Central 211 Butte County, Safe Space Winter Shelter, Veterans Resource Center, Catalyst Domestic Violence Services, Butte County Office of Education, Community Action Agency, Salvation Army, Youth for Change, Torres Community Shelter, North Valley Catholic Social Services, Butte Countywide Homeless Continuum of Care, and Butte College, Chico Housing Action Team, Elijah House Foundation, and Jamboree Housing Corporation.
What is the timeline?
- Spring 2021: Move the Jesus Center operations to Fair Street
- Summer 2021: Begin Begin construction on east side of Fair Street for the Renewal Center
- Summer 2022: Open the Renewal Center
How can I get involved?
Call Laura Cootsona at 530.345.2640 x 201 for an appointment to learn how you can invest in the Renewal Center.