wfn.org | Glide Community House to honor San Francisco church's pastor

[NewsDesk <NewsDesk@UMCOM.UMC.ORG>]

July 2, 1998  Contact: Thomas S. McAnally*(615)742-5470*Nashville, Tenn.
{392}  

NOTE: This story is accompanied by a photograph and a sidebar, UMNS
#393.

By Diane Huie Balay*

SAN FRANCISCO (UMNS) - At the entrance to the parking lot, a man in rags
lay face down on the sidewalk, his few belongings scattered around him.
Near him, homeless men huddled under a few trees, their shopping baskets
parked in the shade.

Across the street, men were lining up for a free lunch at a plain
building with bright blue awnings curved over the windows. The awnings'
large white letters proclaimed only one word: "Glide." And that was
enough.

"Glide" is Glide Memorial United Methodist Church in downtown San
Francisco's tough Tenderloin District. The racially diverse,
8,000-plus-member congregation and its pastor, the Rev. Cecil Williams,
have a national reputation for ministry to those in trouble.  

It is for people in trouble that the church is building the $11.5
million, nine-story Cecil Williams Glide Community House adjacent to the
church. The building, funded through government agencies, foundations
and contributions from corporations and private individuals, is expected
to open in early 1999.

"Glide has always stood with those who are most often ignored or
rejected, belittled or powerless," Williams said. "When we asked the
people we serve, 'What one thing do you need the most?' they cried out
for safe, decent housing. We asked them, 'How would you build such a
house?' And we considered their answer."

Decent, affordable housing is extremely difficult to find in the entire
San Francisco Bay region.

Glide's 52-unit community house will make studio, one, two and
three-bedroom apartments available to homeless individuals and families.
It will provide a "safe haven" for recovering addicts, abused women and
HIV-positive men and women and for their children, Williams said.
Depending on family size, between 100 and 140 people will be housed.
They will pay one third of their income for rent.

Unlike shelters that allow people to stay for only one night or for a
very short time before being forced out onto the street and having to
register again, the Glide Community House will allow residents to stay
until they are stable and independent.

"We are offering not a house or a home," said Williams who will retire
in the year 2000.  "We're building a whole community where people can
begin fulfilling their lives."

Through a network of the 39 social services already in place at Glide,
the residents will have a link to a variety of trained case managers;
individual and group counseling; an internationally famous substance
abuse recovery program . . . job skills development and computer
training; health care services and preventive health care (including HIV
and AIDS) education.

A brochure says the community house will provide "a place where people
can experience a sense of community that they most likely have never had
the opportunity to experience before . . . . We can show that providing
a home within a community-not just a shelter-can rekindle hope in the
darkest experiences."
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*Balay is an associate editor of The United Methodist Reporter.