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Volunteers needed for overnight warming center

Welcome back to another Spot- night. That night, Tina was doing in- Civitan Club volunteers every Friday
light Series with Sarah! take, Marje was serving food, Jessica night in the warming center, so
The series where the writer gets was working drinks, and Rich was Solomon and I headed into the food
to know the city more personally, on door duty. Solomon worked the pantry area to help sort food that
while the readers get to know the door with Rich, while I sat down at had just been delivered that day.
writer better in the process. the intake desk with Tina. I learned LHM received food deliveries
I’ve been writing for The Wayne that Tina has been volunteering here twice a week (Monday and Friday)
Dispatch for almost four years now, since 2016. from Gleaners Community Food
but I was featured in The Wayne Dis- Clients (both new or returning) Bank and Forgotten Harvest.
patch before I ever even wrote for it. for the homeless during the winter sign-in for the night and are able to You might think that sounds like
If you’ve been a Wayne Dispatch months, I jumped at the chance, as get out of the cold, have access to hot a lot of food, and you’d be right.
reader for some time now, then you this was close to my heart. food, drinks, clothes, hygienic items, Aside from a grocery store, I don’t
might remember the cover story On Thursday, January 23rd, and can sign-up for a shower. For think I’ve ever seen so much food in
from 2013 about a WMHS senior Solomon and I headed to Lighthouse lights out, men sleep in the chapel a singular location and there were
overcoming obstacles after early Home Mission (LHM) to volunteer at and women sleep in the warming around 14 freezers, including a walk-
years without home. That high the warming center. center area. They are taken outside in freezer, throughout the entire
school senior was me. We knocked on the locked door for two smoke breaks before lights- building that were completely filled.
When I was young, my parents
got divorced. My father refused to
sign the quit claim deed to our
house. Since the house was not
under my mom’s name, she legally
couldn’t pay the bills, and we ended
up getting evicted.
We stayed in a hotel, we slept in
our car, and then we lived in a home-
less shelter.
I was in the third grade when all
of this happened, but I remembered
enough of it that I was able to share
my experience my senior year of high
school.
During my senior year at Wayne
Memorial High School, I wrote for
the school newspaper. Without know-
ing about my past, Mrs. Koch, the
newspaper teacher, suggested we do
a ‘No Home for the Holiday’ theme
for our December issue. I offered to
write a personal narrative about my
experience living in a homeless shel-
ter.
My personal narrative was pub-
lished in the WMHS’s December Sarah with volunteers in the Lighthouse home mission warming center.
2012 issue and then The Wayne Dis- and had no idea what to expect. A out. Due to the need within the com-
patch published it in its February man opened the door and greeted us. New clients have to fill out a ques- munity, within the next few days, all
2013 issue as well. We informed him that we were here tionnaire that allows the center/vol- the food that I was looking at would
I submitted my piece to the MIPA to volunteer and then were pointed unteers to understand every clients’ be gone, and then a new delivery
Spring Conference at Michigan State to the intake desk to the left of the reason for needing shelter and their would come in. So our job for the
University in April 2013 and won door. individual needs moving forward. night was to get everything sorted
first place for Personal Narrative and Tina was the volunteer at the in- Clients can stay up to 30 days, which and organized for the upcoming
second place for Professional Pub- take desk, and she began to explain allows them time to get back on their week.
lished Page. the different roles within the warning feet. On Wednesday and Friday,
As you might recall from a previ- center. I was able to watch Tina check-in Paola’s the one you report to. She’s
ous Spotlight Series with Sarah, I There was a volunteer needed at two new clients that night. 18 clients been volunteering with the food
went on to receive my journalism de- the intake desk that would check-in signed in total. pantry for 20 years and she knows
gree from the University of Michigan- the clients (people in need of the Solomon and I decided we would how things should look, where
Dearborn in April 2017. I grew to warming center), a volunteer serving come back the next night and see things should go, and how to get the
have a passion for helping the less the food, a volunteer serving the what else we could do to help. So on job done.
fortunate through missions and vol- drinks, and a volunteer standing by Friday, January 24th, we returned to Solomon was working with an-
unteer work. the door for security purposes (typi- LHM to volunteer again. other volunteer, Andre, using the pal-
So when I heard about a volun- cally a man) that would check bags We knocked and the door was
teer opportunity at a warming center as clients entered the center for the opened. I learned that the Westland See Spotlight, page 12
The Wayne Dispatch · February 2025 · 11