2020: A Year in Review
Despite the many difficulties of 2020, The Foundry achieved some impactful accomplishments. We celebrated 117 graduates that navigated their recovery journeys, a journey that is hard enough without the stresses of a pandemic. Our logistic and distribution team implemented a new dispatch system, which streamlines our donation pickups and provides program participants employment readiness training on the Verizon Connect system. Changed Lives Christian Center’s mobile medical clinic mobilized to The Foundry Farm in Cullman in February, and now provides primary care services to program participants once a week.
Despite the many challenges the pandemic has presented over the past year, The Foundry continues to experience the Lord’s blessings. One of the biggest blessings has been celebrating 117 program graduates who navigated their recovery journeys in the midst of a pandemic that has been particularly hard on addicts. We’ve also experienced the blessing of generous funders who made it possible to expand our employment readiness efforts as we enter our 50th year of ministry.
The generosity of community businesses and members, grants from Alabama’s Mountains, Rivers and Valleys RC&D Council and Mountain Brook Baptist Church, and the leadership of volunteer David Ozment made a 1,000-square-foot hen house a reality at the Foundry Farm in Cullman. It’s home to 300 hens that lay around 150-200 eggs a day, which feed over 150 program participants in The Foundry’s programs. A couple of program participants are assigned to the hen house at a time as their employment readiness assignment and are learning different aspects of the poultry industry. Cullman County is a state leader in the industry, and the henhouse teaches tangible skills program participants can use to be successful when they complete their recovery journey at The Foundry Farm.
CAWACO and Mountain Brook Baptist Church provided the funding to implement a new dispatch routing system at the distribution center for our thrift stores. The new system replaced a cumbersome, outdated paper system that didn’t adequately equip program participants with customer service tools used in the current business world. In addition to providing program participants valuable training in logistics, the new system continues to save The Foundry time and money as it eliminates over 100 unnecessary donations pick up stops each month.
With many program participants struggling with chronic unemployment, and stability in the workforce being one of the biggest obstacles to long-term sobriety, we’re excited about these opportunities for program participants on their recovery journeys. And it is all possible because of the generosity of others. May these blessings impact many lives over the next 50 years.
