2018 Summer Respite Shelter: Sign up to Volunteer

Since 2011, Old First has partnered with CAMBA and local area churches to operate a respite shelter for two months each summer. The respite shelter provides a dozen men who are participants of CAMBA job training programs with a safe place to sleep and a hot meal.

Old First is thrilled to be entering its eighth annual Summer Respite Shelter!

For the past seven summers, for five nights a week, we’ve provided twelve men with a hot meal and a comfortable bed, partnering with other congregations and local service agency CAMBA.  Each year, hundreds of volunteers, friends, and neighbors from Old First, Park Slope, and local partner congregations come together to host them. This year’s shelter will run 9 weeks from July 2 to August 31, 2018.

Volunteers can sign up online for the following roles:

• Old First Evening Coordinator (6:00-8:00 pm) Aside from greeting the men and volunteers, the Old First Evening Coordinator is someone from Old First (or someone similarly familiar with the building) who ensures the overnight hosts are familiar with the space and their responsibilities. Coordinators also open the building at 6:00 pm, welcome the guests, and help set up for dinner.
• Dinner Host (6:30-8:00 pm) Dinner hosts are responsible for preparing and serving dinner to the men
  staying in our shelter and to any volunteers present. Dinner hosts are also responsible for cleaning up the kitchen and dining area (putting away tables and chairs) after dinner. We recommend that you prepare enough dinner to feed 22 people. In the past, dinner hosts have often brought a prepared meal with them,
  although a kitchen is available at Old First if preferred.
• Overnight Host (7:30 pm – 6:30 am) Overnight Hosts sleep overnight at Old First and serve as contact person for Old First and CAMBA in the unlikely event of an emergency. In the morning, the Overnight Hosts also pass out Metro cards to the men and perform a quick clean-up of the space after the men depart. Overnight hosts sleep in the Old First church office, a private and secure room with a bathroom. The office is located directly on the left upon entering from Carroll St.

We invite all our Old First congregants and Park Slope neighbors to sign up online or contact our 2018 shelter coordinator Jack Holloway at johndanielwashere@gmail.com.

For more about this unique opportunity to help our neighbors, read about why Michael volunteers and about our 2016 season.