By Arthur E. Foulkes
The Tribune-Star
BLOOMFIELD
March 23, 2009 11:43 pm
—
Deep in Greene County, people on a mission to help others now need help themselves.
The Family Life Center, an all-volunteer Christian ministry in Bloomfield, may have to drop most of its outreach if significant financial assistance doesn’t arrive soon.
“If [the center] goes away, it’s going to affect some folks,” said Dianne Langer, executive director of the ministry, which last year provided direct material help to more than 1,500 needy families.
On the square in Bloomfield, the ministry needs at least $2,200 per month to keep helping people, Langer said. Without that money, nearly all of the services the center now provides will have to be suspended by the end of this month.
“We do a lot of good for the entire area,” said Susan Shake, the volunteer cook at the center.
The Family Life Center provides free clothing, food, school supplies, furniture, shoes, mentoring, tutoring and support group services for dozens of people each day, Langer said.
lthough local churches support the ministry, it is not directly tied to a specific church, she said.
Late Monday morning, several families browsed the ministry’s “free store” in Bloomfield, and about 20 people, including several young children, sat down for a free lunch of spaghetti, salad, bread and coffee cake.
“They’re really good people,” said Kristi Vester of Bloomfield, who was shopping at the store with her three children. Vester, who sometimes volunteers for the ministry, said her children have received school backpacks, loaded with supplies, as well as clothing and other items at the center.
“It does help us,” she said.
The Family Life Center is “the most important organization within our county that serves people that have needs,” said Katey Baruth, a psychologist and program manager for Hamilton Center in Greene County. About 85 percent of Hamilton Center’s mental health clients in the county use the center.
“Without the Family Life Center, there would be a huge hole within the county,” Baruth said.
The goal of the center is to break “generational poverty,” Langer said, and the two keys for doing that are relationships and education. The center attempts to help in those two areas by offering counseling, support groups, mentoring, tutoring and a lending library with educational materials.
“They are kind of a jack of all trades,” Baruth said.
The center is seeing increased demand for its services as the economic slump continues, Langer said. In addition to generational poverty, the incidence of “situational poverty” has climbed. “The need is becoming greater and greater and greater,” she said.
The Family Life Center has been operating for 10 years and attempts to help people within about 25 miles of Bloomfield, including portions of Sullivan, Daviess and Clay counties. The center was started with a dozen volunteers and $500, Langer said. Last year the organization had more than 260 volunteers.
“That’s just amazing,” she said.
The financial crisis, however, has put the center’s programs in danger, Langer said. Many churches and individual donors have seen a big drop in their investment portfolio values and no longer have cash to contribute, she said, adding that the center has been trying with no luck to raise money since October.
According to the most recent figures available on the Indiana Department of Workforce Development’s Web site, Greene County ranked seventh in the state in 2005 for childhood poverty and 13th in the state for poverty overall. By comparison, Vigo County, also in 2005, ranked tenth in the state for childhood poverty and seventh overall.
“She does help a lot of people,” said Shawn Murdock about Langer. A Bloomfield resident and volunteer at the center, Murdock said he has used the organization in the past to help his family. Of Langer he said, “I hate to see her in this position.”
“This is what we do every day,” Langer said, looking around at the activity in the former Rexall Drug Store that volunteers have converted into the ministry. The center is open Monday through Friday, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., but has support group activities late in the evenings, she said. “We wouldn’t be doing this if God hadn’t called us.”
For more information about the center, call Dianne Langer at (812) 384-1639. Donations can be mailed to The Family Life Center, 19 S. Washington St., Bloomfield, IN. 47424. Information also is available on the center’s Web site at www.flcminis.org.
Arthur Foulkes can be reached at (812) 231-4232 or arthur.foulkes@tribstar.com.
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