How can an empty building be renovated and made available for community programs for all ages and a meeting place for the neighborhood? With your help!

Edgewood Congregational Church, United Church of Christ purchased a former grocery store adjacent to the church around 1950 and connected it to the main church building through a covered hallway. Originally, the building was used for church school classes and later rented out, most recently for a nursery school. But for three or four years now it has sat vacant and in disrepair, not only an eyesore but also a waste of a valuable community resource – especially as meeting spaces are limited in Edgewood, particularly as the Hall Library has had to cut its hours.

Although eager to make a difference, the church has faced two impossible tasks; finding the funding to fix it up so that it could be used as a community center and finding a program “anchor” appropriate for the neighborhood that would make the renovation cost effective.

Both have happened in just the past two months. First, Serve Rhode Island agreed to partner with Edgewood Church to find the resources and volunteer labor to do the renovation, which began on the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday, Jan. 18, and will continue in the spring. Although the brick structure is sound, it is begging for a major face-lift inside and out, and it needs to be outfitted with shelves and closets, tables and chairs and everything else to make it comfortable and usable.

Second, Riverside Congregational Church in East Providence was looking for a way to expand its very successful “After School with the Arts” program for students in kindergarten through grade 5. So Edgewood Church will become part of that nonprofit corporation, which will establish such a program here in Edgewood with a planned opening in September of this year. While providing an option for after-school care for working parents, the program also will teach and mentor children in music, art, theater and perhaps martial arts. While learning to draw and paint and play an instrument of their choice, not only will they develop skills and confidence, the children will also develop resilience to such temptations as drug use and gang violence. Scholarships will be found for those who cannot afford to pay tuition.

Once the new “Edgewood Family Center” is open, other programs can be added. It can be used mornings for senior citizens; evenings for community classes, support groups, and meetings; and weekends for youth. The Cranston Senior Center has expressed an interest in use of a facility on the east side of the city, and members of the church are interested in offering educational events for all ages, such as a “sports equipment swap” as the seasons change. To facilitate the development of the Family Center, we will organize a Church and Community Advisory Board in the spring and involve the neighbors.

This is the vision that AmeriCorps launched with their efforts on MLK Day 2010.

Rev. Betsy Garland is the Interim Minister at Edgewood Congregational Church.