By Charles Petty
After years of fundraising and preparation, a crowd gathered Friday and broke ground on Outreach Mission Inc.’s homeless shelter.
The Samuel J. Wornom Community Shelter, slated to open in 2025 at the intersection of Third Street and Oakwood Avenue, will be able to house 76 client beds which include four family rooms. A full kitchen and laundry room will also be available. The facility is being built after six years of raising funds from various organizations, trusts, and individuals.
The center is named after late local businessman and entrepreneur Sam Wornom, who had been a major contributor to OMI and other charities for many years. The faith-based OMI has been a leading advocate for the homeless in Lee County for over 40 years. The center will be over 8,500 square feet and will have the ability to serve 30 men, 30 women, and four families.
OMI’s goal is to help out members of the community that need support with food, clothing, and emotional support. Their mission statement is “helping people put their lives back together, one piece at a time, one person at a time.”
Since the 1980s, OMI has contributed to several mission efforts, including housing homeless men in a shelter and providing them hot meals and a bath. By building this new homeless shelter, OMI hopes to tackle the current issues of poverty and homelessness in Sanford with rapid response and help to ensure their clients are non recurring by helping them get back on their feet.
According to the S3 Housing Connect, Sanford’s homelessness task force, the recent numbers show that approximately 157 people are currently housing insecure in Sanford. Among the 157, at least four veterans are homeless, 33 percent are living in an emergency shelter, and 58 percent are currently in an unsheltered situation. After years of city council meetings and hearing from both community members and civic organizations, it was decided that a large shelter needed to be constructed to help better reach the needs of those facing housing insecurity.
Many members of community leadership both past and present were on hand for the breaking ground ceremony. Among them was former mayor Chet Mann, who during his time in office was a vocal advocate for bettering the lives of the homeless in Sanford.
“When we do things right in Sanford, it comes down to collaboration,” he said. “Everything gets done with the hard work of our community members. What we have been able to do is bring together the various agencies in Lee County and Sanford involved with helping people in need to collaborate together. The outcome is going to be this incredible facility that we so sorely lack and will greatly help our town tackle homelessness.”
OMI Board President Hamer Carter praised the work the OMI team had undertaken to ensure the homeless shelter would be constructed. He also thanked the many volunteers who have dedicated their time and talents and money to seeing the vision of the center become a reality.
Current Mayor Rebecca Salmon said she was thankful that the addition would help those who have fallen on hard times find a place to start again.
“This is an amazing day for Sanford, this is a truly community transformational project that is going to help our community today and in the years to come,” she said.
Among the donors who gave for the center was the State Employees Credit Union Foundation, which has now for the first time funded a large capital project in Lee County. The SECU Foundation helped raise $1.2 million for the center. It is part of the Foundation’s ongoing efforts to help North Carolina communities both big and tall serve the needs of its citizens. Other groups which helped to contribute were the Friends of Sam Wornom, FHL Bank, Fidelity Bank, and the North Carolina Housing Finance Agency.
I hope and pray they have better counseling,and staff than they had before