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Following Wednesday's press conference at the former Farmington Family Fun Center, members of the Farmington Ministerial Alliance Board, local pastors and supporters posed for a photo after announcing "an anonymous donor" had given the building to the organization at no charge.
The board of the Farmington Ministerial Alliance announced at a press conference held at noon Wednesday that the recently closed Farmington Family Fun Center has been donated to the organization and by the end of summer will be the new home for its food pantry and thrift store.
The Farmington Ministerial Alliance Board had been praying a new location could be found for the organization’s food pantry and thrift store after learning it would have to move from its present location at 4331 Showplace Drive by the end of August, but even they were surprised by the big way God had answered their prayers.
The board, along with a number of local pastors and Ministerial Alliance supporters, gathered at the former location of the Farmington Family Fun Center at 765 Weber Road at noon Wednesday to hold a press conference to officially announce that "an anonymous donor" has given the organization the large building at no cost now that the fun center has been closed.
Board members present were President Arthur Menard, pastor of Church of the Nazarene; Vice President Alan Berry, pastor of Farmington Christian Church; Treasurer Greg Robinson, pastor of First Baptist Church Farmington; Secretary Rocky Good, pastor of New Heights Church; and Director of Benevolence Nancy Faulkner who runs the thrift store and food pantry.
“We have been blessed by the donation of this huge building that we will be moving our thrift store and food pantry into,” said Faulkner. “We also have some space that will be rental space for offices that will help pay the overhead of the building because the building is obviously way too big for just us. Construction is going on right now and we’re looking at it to be done by the end of July and to be in here by the end of August. Of course, that’s always up for change.
“A couple of things about the building itself, we’ll have about 5,500+ square feet that will become the food pantry. Part of that will be a ‘behind the scenes’ food pantry where we’ll have overstock, our walk-in coolers and the [place] where we will bring stuff in. And then, where the restaurant and skating rink used to be, will become the actual food pantry where our clients will come in. We’re excited to say our pantry is going to be total client choice. When they come, they will be able to shop just like it’s a grocery store.”
Faulkner added that there will continue to be volunteers who will walk through the store to offer guidance to the shoppers as needed.
“They’ll get to pick their own instead of us just putting meat in their cart,” she said. “If they don’t want something, they can pick something from the variety of meats that we have. So, we’re very excited. It’s something we’ve wanted to do for a long time. The thrift store is going to be a little over 21,000-square-feet.
“There is going to be a huge area that’s going to be where the furniture area is going to be and we’re going to more than double our clothing racks. Of course, given this amount of space, we need volunteers even more than we needed them before. We need volunteers in our thrift store. We need volunteers in our food pantry more than we ever needed them because we will have so much more space to cover.”
Asked what their reaction was when they were told the building was going to be donated to their organization, Faulkner said, “When we found out — it was told to us in a meeting — I know I had tears in my eyes. When he told us I was in total shock. I tell this story that a long time ago, right after the skating rink went up for sale, somebody made the mistake of saying to me, ‘You know the bowling alley is up for rent,’ because they knew we were looking for a building. I knew they were talking about the skating rink, but I chuckled and said, ‘Only in my wildest dreams.’ The tears were rolling down my eyes when [the man told us about the donation] and I said, ‘OK, my wildest dreams have come true.’”
Because of the size of the new food pantry, Faulkner said she’s looking forward to having more walk-in refrigerator space so that milk can be offered on a regular basis. And as far as the extra space available for the thrift store, she is looking forward to having more space for furniture to be put on display and the ability to pick up used furniture at the homes of donors.
Faulkner noted that the Ministerial Alliance had been looking for two years for a new food pantry and thrift store location after being informed that the lease would be up at the end of August of this year and that the organization would need to find a new location.
Vice President Berry said, “We assumed we were going to have to buy a place. We didn’t expect a gift, so we were trying to find a place that would match up with our needs. Then this man just said, ‘How would you like to have the bowling alley?’ — and that he could arrange it as a gift. It was certainly a gift from God.”
President Menard explained that it was God’s direct intervention that made the search unique.
“Of course, there was a time that our lease would run out,” he said. “We’d been looking all over the community for a place that was within our budget and that we could rent — never having the anticipation of owning. But it came to the point where we were thinking that maybe we could own, but that would put us in debt. So, we just said, ‘Let’s pray to God. Let’s believe in a miracle,’ and you know how that goes — there’s a little doubt, how is this ever going to be possible?’ And, yes, we may have tarried a little bit at times, thinking this was just too big of an event that could occur, but then this came up in one of the meetings.
“This person just shows up and says, ‘Here you go,’ and God delivers. I mean, come on now! That’s crazy — and look at the timescale of how all this has happened. The neat thing about it was to actually build the facility that we wanted, it would have cost a tremendous amount of money and it would be in a different location far away. And to get it right smack dab in the middle of the community. Just think about that for a moment. It just blows your mind. Everything happened just the way God wanted it.”
Treasurer Good announced that the alliance has also received a financial challenge from a businessman in the community called the Double Up Challenge
“If we would come up with $100,000, he would match that $100,000, so there’s a lot of renovation — you see a new pallet of racks over here — those kinds of items that we need for the thrift store and the food pantry,” he said. “Both of those items are much needed and just a tremendous amount of fixing up [is required]. We’re going to need to update our computer system and the cash registers — all kinds of things you need whenever you expand like this. We’re challenging the churches, civic organizations and people in the community to contribute. So far, toward this $100,000, we have raised over $21,000 already from three churches and other individuals — and we’ve only been talking about it for a couple of weeks.
“We’re excited about the seed that has been given. We have another $5,000 I just found out a few minutes ago is going to be given toward this cause, so we’re well on the way to our goal. One-hundred-thousand dollars is what we’re reaching for, so we’ll be doing that through the summer. We don’t really have a deadline for when that needs to be in, but we would like everything wrapped up as far as that matching $100,000 by the end of July so that whenever we’re making the transition to move in here, we’ll have all of our debts paid and everything will be straight.”
For information regarding the Double Up Challenge, call 573-631-1675.
“The great part about this is that if you give $20, it turns into $40; you give $50 and it turns into $100; you give $1,000, it turns into $2,000,” Good said. “It’s a win-win opportunity for the Ministerial Alliance, as well as our community to be able to meet the needs of our needy people in our community.”
While the board was unwilling to name the person or persons donating the building to the ministerial alliance or offered to match donations up to $100,000, the city verified that local businessman Sharo Shirshekan was the previous owner of the building.
Shirshekan recently built and donated a 62-bed shelter on the grounds of the former Mineral Area Regional Medical Center in Farmington to provide temporary housing for the homeless and donated the medical center building to East Missouri Action Agency.
Closing out the press conference, Treasurer Robinson said, “Some exciting things are happening for the Ministerial Alliance and the food pantry. We’re just excited to get behind the movement that’s happening here and hope our community will get involved with financial gifts and more people volunteering. God has blessed us and brought this about at the right time. We can’t wait to see what’s coming up in the years ahead.”
Kevin R. Jenkins is the managing editor of the Farmington Press and can be reached at 573-783-9667 or kjenkins@farmingtonpressonline.com
“We have been blessed by the donation of this huge building that we will be moving our thrift store and food pantry into.” – Nancy Faulkner, director of benevolence
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Following Wednesday's press conference at the former Farmington Family Fun Center, members of the Farmington Ministerial Alliance Board, local pastors and supporters posed for a photo after announcing "an anonymous donor" had given the building to the organization at no charge.
The board of the Farmington Ministerial Alliance announced at a press conference held at noon Wednesday that the recently closed Farmington Family Fun Center has been donated to the organization and by the end of summer will be the new home for its food pantry and thrift store.
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