Photo provided Calvary Community Church is partnering with other groups to secure funding to renovate the church’s basement as part of an effort seeking to improve the quality of life and health of residents in the Lincoln Central Neighborhood in Columbus. The project, which has an estimated $75,489 price tag, is the work of Empower 365,
Groups with ties to Calvary Community Church are hoping to secure funding to renovate the church’s basement as part of an effort seeking to improve the quality of life and health of residents in the Lincoln Central Neighborhood in Columbus.
The project, which has an estimated $75,489 price tag, is the work of Empower 365, the church’s health and wellness team, in collaboration with Live!, a partnership between the church, Lincoln Central Neighborhood Family Center and other organizations.
The organizations are seeking to, among other things, renovate the church’s basement, upgrade its kitchen and install an ADA-compliant ramp and full restroom with the hope of becoming a hot meal site for the homeless and providing mental health training and an assortment of classes, including classes on nutrition, cooking and financial literacy.
The basement of the church, located at 1031 Chestnut St., includes a roughly 1,512-square-foot fellowship hall and a roughly 312-square-foot kitchen, officials said.
Michelle Mulimba, who is one of several people involved with the effort, said that the project is inspired by “blue zones,” which refers to regions where individuals are claimed to have longer lifespans than average because of certain lifestyle choices.
Some notable “blue zones” include Okinawa Prefecture in Japan and Nuoro Province in Sardinia, Italy.
“We were just really interested in why they’re able to have so many centenarians and what they are doing and how can we kind of implement that in the downtown area,” Mulimba said. “That’s how we formed the group Live!”
“We feel like people would be … not only comfortable (in this neighborhood), (but also) just have easier access to us, rather than maybe like a NexusPark or something like that,” Mulimba added. “So, we just wanted to do something where we can just upgrade our kitchen. We want to be a hot meal site for the homeless. …We want to do some mental health training in the fellowship hall, so that’s why we want to upgrade the fellowship hall as well.”
Empower 365, for its part, also previously started a community garden across the street from the church, called the “Garden of Eden,” and hopes to be able to use the renovated kitchen to “wash and process the produce a little bit better,” Mulimba said.
“We wanted to have a station in the kitchen where we could do that,” she added.
The groups have applied for grants from the African American Fund, the first Presbyterian Foundation and the Custer and Nugent Foundations to help bankroll the project, official said.
Overall, Mulimba said everyone involved with the project is hoping to help increase the quality of life and health of people in the Lincoln Central Neighborhood in Columbus.
“With everything we’re doing, it just makes sense to just completely remodel things if possible, and if we can get the funds from different organizations in Columbus, that would be amazing, because we just want everyone to buy in,” Mulimba said. “We just want everyone to just be as excited about it as we are.”
Other people involved with the project include Calvary leaders Judy Jackson, Jeanette Marsh, Freddie King, Shirley Jenkins, Pastor Frank Griffin, as well as Live! leaders Sarla Kalsi, Randy Allman, Diane Doup and Robin Willats.
Funding for the project will be handled by the church’s non-profit organization.
