We ask Hopedale members and friends to help serve and assist our neighbors and friends at the Community Meal Center at the Zion Lutheran Church, 212 South Front St. in Hamilton, Ohio, on the first Friday of every month, from 5:00 to 7:30 PM. If you would like to know more about the Meal Center or would like to carpool from Oxford, please call Liz Woedl at 513-280-1044.
Tag: community
Oxford Community Choice Pantry
We encourage Hopedale members and friends to volunteer as shopping assistants for our friends and neighbors at the Oxford Community Choice Pantry (OCCP), 400 W. Withrow St., Oxford, Ohio. OCCP serves approximately 300 households in the Talawanda School District. You can find out more at http://www.oxchoicepantry.org/ or by calling 513-523-3851. The “support” page on their website features many ways you can help OCCP!
Everybody Has a Right to Live!
This summer, we are framing a number of our services with the 40 days of Action of the Poor People’s Campaign, which began on May 13 and end on June 23. This focus is consistent with the 2014-2018 UUA Congregational Study Action issue, “Escalating Inequality.” The themes for our first three services represent the focuses of the national Poor People’s Campaign for those weeks.
Sunday, June 10, Noon- This Sunday, we will gather at noon at Merry Day Park in Oxford for a potluck picnic and a facilitated conversation, “The TOPSS One Stop Shop: A Vision of Unity for Social Services” Facilitators: Lara Osborne and Chris Shoker. “For several years, a committed group of Oxford citizens worked hard to get a One Stop Shop for social services established in Oxford. The primary barriers were land and money. Those efforts were largely abandoned in 2013. In the meantime, the City of Oxford acquired a parcel of land within the mobile home park, Merry Day Park. The current home of the pantry is owned by St. Mary’s church, and is need of demolition. We agreed to leave by June 30, 2020. As we did extensive research both on our customers’ needs and on possible locations, it became clear we would need to build a new building. Our then president, Edna Southard, a city council member, approached the city about building in the underutilized park. Oxford City Council passed an ordinance allowing the pantry to build on the Merry Day Park site. This presented a marvelous opportunity to begin exploring the One Stop Shop idea again. Our dream is a building that can help create social integration and reduce stigma along the 27 North corridor. We hope to unify fragmented services and reduce or eliminate the transportation barriers that hold low income people back. So the Oxford Community Choice Pantry will soon formally become TOPSS: The Talawanda Oxford Pantry and Social Services. The TOPSS One Stop Shop is in the process of exploring collaborations and funding, and working with builders to create a proposed vision of unity to take back to city council.”
Lara Osborne is a social worker who has worked in and taught social services for over 20 years, and has been locally active on food justice issues through OEFFA, the Oxford Uptown Farmers Market, and Moon.
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Chris Shoker builds large commercial greenhouses that have 10x the yield over field grown produce without the use of pesticides, while capturing and using C02 emissions and reclaiming 99% of the water used. These innovations reduce the footprint of agriculture and protect the environment. If you’ve bought a tomato from Kroger lately, it was likely grown in an Ohio greenhouse.
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The Park has a picnic shelter and tables. Please bring your own paper goods and a potluck dish to share; drinks will be provided. Merry Day Park is located by turning left onto Reagh Way as you are traveling north on College Corner Pike, Route 27, out of Oxford. The Park is at the end of Reagh Way.
Next Sunday, July 17, 12pm: We’ll be back at the Hopedale UU Community for Community Potluck. Then at 12:30pm, we will examine the distorted moral narrative afterwards, hearing from Bonita Porter about gun control.
Look Who’s Building Houses!
Faith Build Habitat for Humanity Projects Update
The house we started working on in November 2017 is soooo very close to completion. The driveway didn’t get poured last week so they put off the dedication until Saturday, June 9, 1pm.
The five, Oxford area churches have accomplished much during the past several months, in spite of interference from delays due to challenging weather. Thanks, everyone, for your dedication and strength.
The UU part of the work crew is next scheduled to be at Carter Court on June 30 and July 28. If you’d like to give us a hand with the build or help with lunch prep, please give me a call at 513-280-1044.
Step up and be a part of Economic Justice in your neck of the woods!
Hopedale is putting together crews of workers to participate in the 2017 Faith Build in the Oxford area, a Habitat for Humanity project. Oxford area churches are joining together with Miami Students and other community organizations to fund and build the 9th and 10th Habitat houses in the development of Reckford Woods. These last two houses provide an opportunity for the faith community to serve alongside and partner with a Habitat Home Buyer Family. Each home buyer family must contribute over 500 hours of “sweat equity” in the building of the house.
The foundation for the 9th house is going to be poured and work on the structure will begin on November 4 and will continue throughout the fall and winter finishing up in the spring. Oxford Presbyterian Church, Holy Trinity Episcopal Church, St. Mary Catholic Church, Oxford United Methodist Church, Hopedale UUs, and Faith Lutheran Church have banded together for this venture.
Each church will provide build teams of volunteers for Saturday through Thursday workdays. A typical build schedule is approximately 16-20 weeks with 20 volunteers working each Saturday. No experience is necessary and all supervision, tools and equipment are provided. The churches participating in the Faith Build will share the cost of the home with other donor sources. Cool T-shirts will be available for reasonable fee to help with fundraising.
Our bit: On each of three scheduled workdays, 5 Hopedale friends and members will work on the house site with 10 Miami U. students, and 5 Habitat workers. We will also provide a lunch for the 20 worker/volunteers on those days. You don’t have to be a skilled house builder to participate! The Habitat workers provide the expertise and the MU student provide the oomph. People, 16 and older, can work on the house and those who are younger can help with making and serving lunch.
Dates needing a Hopedale presence
- Nov 11, Noon- onsite Kickoff with the Crawfords.
- Dec 9, ALL DAY- onsite Hopedale Work Day, we provide 5 workers
- Jan 27, ALL DAY- onsite Hopedale Work Day, we provide 5 workers
- Mar 10, ALL DAY- onsite Hopedale Work Day, we provide 5 workers
You can contribute in so may ways, work on the house, prepare lunch for the volunteers, make individual contributions and support fundraisers to raise the funds for Habitat. Please call Liz Woedl, 513-280-1044, if you are interested in joining the effort.
(Hopedale volunteers from a previous Faith Build)
Habitat House Dedication
The home built by Habitat for Humanity/Faith Build is finished! There will be a Dedication of the Boggs Family home on Sunday, October 21, 2 pm at the house site off Hester Road. On hand will be volunteers from the various churches who helped sponsor the project, including Hopedale UU Community.
Social Justice Committee, HUUC 