The concept of supporting a community can mean many things to many people and organizations. In the case of Haven From Hunger and their parent organization, Citizen’s Inn, supporting the community means providing people with the most basic necessities; food, and a place to call home.

Haven From Hunger and Citizen’s Inn’s mission is a simple one; leaving homelessness and hunger behind. Their focus is assisting their clients with homelessness and food deficiency though offering various temporary housing and meal programs. Clients are encouraged and supported in rebuilding their lives and eventually achieving stability and independence. Citizen’s Inn believes strongly in protecting the family unit, offering temporary housing for entire families, giving them a space of their own and keeping their family together.

Over the past few years, as Citizen’s Inn came to acquire Haven From Hunger to form one unified organization, MRG has had the opportunity to provide our services on several projects throughout the organization. The most recent, and arguably one of the most influential to Haven From Hunger was the renovation and installation of their new, fully equipped, code compliant commercial kitchen.

We were able to witness, first-hand, how important this kitchen project was to the Haven during our own meal prep and serving experience. The new kitchen offers staff and volunteers the necessities for providing clients home cooked dinners each night. The kitchen flows as any other commercial kitchen would, with purpose. Unlike most commercial kitchens however, the purpose of Haven’s is to serve its patrons with a well-balanced meal and a sense of community. On any given evening, clients stop by to enjoy one of Chef and Kitchen Genius, Brianne Jurs’ hearty soups and homemade dinners that she’s whipped up from whatever the pantry can offer.  Brianne knowingly plans her meals with an understanding of who her clients are and what they need. Haven offers second helpings, third helpings and doggy bags, which provides Brianne and Haven’s volunteers piece of mind knowing that evening’s clients will leave happy and well fed.

Citizen’s Inn has some big plans in the works for improvements to Haven From Hunger’s facility and client offerings. Plans include adding another fully equipped commercial kitchen, full dining area, and offices. Citizen’s hope for the expansion to their second floor facility is the ability to offer rental opportunities for other business and organizations for food prep, classes, meetings ect. MRG and others in the community continue to support the outstanding efforts of the Citizen’s Inn team for their commitment to providing the best possible service to their very deserving clients.

For more information about how you can get involved visit Citizen’s Inn http://www.citizensinn.org/

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