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Bread Of Life Ministries Fighting For Survival

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By GEORGE WILKENS

The Tampa Tribune

Published: July 23, 2008

PLANT CITY - Bread of Life Ministries, an organization marking 15 years of assisting local families through a variety of charitable programs, is fighting a two-front battle spawned by economically challenging times.

As the needs of impoverished clients mount and operating costs skyrocket, donations that fuel the nonprofit organization are on a downward spiral.

"So we are struggling," said Julio Santana, who said he was directed to Plant City by divine intervention.

"The Lord steered me to Florida," said Santana, founder and director of the mission in a former funeral home at 908 E. Reynolds St.

The dire situation at Bread of Life Ministries inspired him to mail letters to 700 local businesses and churches soliciting volunteers, financial assistance and donations of used clothing and household items.

"We started with $1,00015 years ago," initially focusing on the needs of the thousands of migrant workers in the Plant City area, said the man everyone calls "Pastor Julio."

Soon, the broad range of services was expanded to help the needy of all races and nationalities.

In addition to emergency food and clothing assistance, Bread of Life provides free after-school tutoring for children in kindergarten through the fifth grade.

Santana, 59, migrated from his native Puerto Rico to the Northeast in 1972 after a teacher strike in that U.S. territory left him without work.

Eventually settling in Derry, N.H., he joined a church that sponsored a Christian mission in Honduras. He soon convinced the pastor, the pastor's wife and two other couples to take a crash course in Spanish, so he and the group could visit the mission in the Central American republic, among the poorest nations in the Western Hemisphere.

"I almost cried when I saw the poverty," said Santana, whose office bookshelf holds albums of photographs he took of the wretched conditions in San Pedro Sula, the second-largest city in Honduras.

Photos depict family homes made of cardboard, an infant in a crib improvised from a banana box, a naked toddler trailing his mother along a dirty unpaved street, young children preparing meals on outdoor wood-burning stoves, and churches and other structures that are little more than shacks.

"I saw the need, and I said I really need to go back there and help," Santana recalled.

Upon returning to New Hampshire, he told his wife, Elba, also a teacher, "I think the Lord is calling me to do something in Honduras."

Students at the Derry high school where Santana taught history, social studies and Spanish helped collect shoes for the mission.

Divine intervention included a detour, however. One summer, Bill Cruz, a friend in Wimauma and pastor of Good Samaritan Mission, sought Santana's assistance with the migrant program there. Santana's duties included traveling to Plant City to translate for migrants during court appearances.

"I saw so many Mexicans at the courthouse without translators," he said, and became aware of the many migrant workers, assisted then solely by a small volunteer effort at Plant City's St. Clement Catholic Church. "I saw a need here."

He looked around, found and rented a storefront on U.S. 92 just west of town. Five years later the mission was moved to the former Wells Memorial Funeral Home building at Reynolds and Johnson streets that was erected in 1946 and vacant for five years.

In addition to the Club 245 after-school program and emergency assistance, Bread of Life periodically provides English-language classes, vocational training, an Adopt a Child for Christmas program and an August drive to provide students with school supplies, backpacks and shoes. Several sessions of vacation Bible school are held each year.

Counting referrals from local churches, social service agencies and community members, Bread of Life has assisted more than 10,000 families, Santana said.

From 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Aug. 9, Bread of Life will have a combination yard sale and carnival, with games, booths, face painting, and hot dogs and other food available for purchase at a nominal price.

"We're trying to get more of the community involved," said Alicia Nielsen, office manager for the charity that relies upon volunteers for tutoring and other services and derives a little income through its thrift store, which is always eager for donations of clean clothing, shoes, household items and working appliances.

"No one really sees us, but we do a lot here," she said.

"We're trying to open new avenues," Nielsen said. "We'd love to start a middle school program similar to the one the mission runs Tuesdays and Thursdays for younger children, picking up nearly 20 students at Jackson Elementary."We need all the help we can get. I know there are people out there with a heart to help children," and it isn't necessary that tutors be bilingual, said Nielsen, a psychology major at Southeastern University in Lakeland.

Meanwhile, economic conditions have forced its chief supplier, Nativity Food Bank in Dover, to cut allotments to area churches by half. Midway through a recent two-hour Wednesday morning food distribution at Bread of Life, the pantry was already bare.

"This used to be filled, always," Santana said.

Likewise, the freezer is empty.

The thrift store, which has traditionally funded half of the operating budget, had a 50 percent drop in business a year ago and has only rebounded about 10 percent, Nielsen said.

"We're seeing fewer donations" and, at the same time, a 22 percent increase in the number of families seeking food and clothing through the organization's emergency assistance program, she said.

The mission's spring newsletter seeking financial assistance produced little.

"We got maybe 30 replies out of 12,000" newsletters mailed in March, Nielsen said.

Additionally, gasoline costs for the mission's 20-passenger bus, van and pickup have doubled to $600 monthly, electricity is running $300, "and the insurance bill is killing us, but we need it," Santana said.

The mission's washing machine and lawn tractor just died, and the 5,000-square-foot building has maintenance issues. The roof leaks, "but only when it rains," Santana jokes.

The daily struggle is overshadowed by the smiles and long-term successes, documented in photographs on the mission's walls. Santana points to a group photo of a dozen former migrant workers, smiling graduates of a vocational program the mission sponsored.

"Those ladies were able to get from the tomato field to the nursing field," Santana said with a smile of his own.

AT A GLANCE

WHAT: Bread of Life Ministries

WHERE: 908 E. Reynolds St., Plant City

SERVICE TIMES: 10 a.m. (English) and 10:15 a.m. (Spanish) Wednesday

THRIFT SHOP HOURS: 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday, Thursday and Friday; 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Saturday

CLUB 245: After-school tutoring is 2:30 p.m. Tuesday and Thursday.

FOOD BANK: 10 a.m. to noon Wednesday

CALL: (813) 754-2840

E-MAIL: breadoflifestaff@juno.com

HOW YOU CAN HELP

NEEDS: Clothing and shoes in good, clean condition; electric appliances in good working condition; furniture, household items; mattresses; canned goods, other nonperishable food; financial assistance; donations of services

TUTORS NEEDED: To assist children, kindergarten through fifth grade, with homework, 2:30 p.m. Tuesday and/or Thursday (don't have to be bilingual)

VOLUNTEERS: For thrift shop, building maintenance, landscaping and other duties

CARNIVAL: 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Aug. 9 at the mission, 908 E. Reynolds St., Plant City; yard sale with a carnival theme, to include booths, games, face painting, food and refreshments available for purchase

Reporter George Wilkens can be reached at (813) 865-4433 or gwilkens@tampatrib.com.

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