Back at UMOM

Mark and I are back at UMOM United Methodist Outreach Mission in Phoenix. We arrived here on Saturday and set up camp on the black top parking lot out back. UMOM is the largest women's shelter in Arizona. UMOM houses about 100 families who are homeless and/or abused and there is a section for veterans without homes. The mission is made from two hotels that sit side by side. UMOM has a 50's restaurant and they hope to get it up and running to help teach waitressing, and cooking. They help people get there GED if needed. UMOM has free babysitting and they help women apply for jobs. Before we left in December UMOM was holding a boot camp to help people apply for jobs, make resumes and hold mock interviews. The clothes closet has interview clothes that they give away to those who are going to an actual interview. The success rate here is 87%. That means, homeless families find employment and affordable housing move out and don't need help again from UMOM. I think that is really good rate. The families come into a 90 day emergency housing (one hotel room) and when space is available they can move into a two room with a kitchenette. The families can now stay up to 2 years.

It is currently Sunday night and we will be getting our assignments on Monday morning so I'll try to keep the blog going as to what we are doing and take some pictures to make this a little more interesting. Hopefully I've worked out the bugs in blog.

Pam