‘We stand ready’: Rock Hill’s Pathways will run homeless day shelter after ROC closes
Rock Hill’s homeless day shelter will remain open despite Renew Our Community closing its doors.
The Pathways Community Center, a Christian-based nonprofit with a mission to create one location for multiple agencies and services for people in crisis, will run it.
Renew Our Community, a nonprofit homeless day shelter and crisis assistance center, announced Tuesday it was closing after eight years serving the community. The Pathways’ Board of Directors met Tuesday and voted to take over.
ROC, which is located in Pathways, will shut down operations Wednesday at 5 p.m. due to inadequate funding.
Pathways will operate the day shelter for the near-term starting Thursday.
Pathways Chairman Charles Price said ROC leaders notified Pathways last week that the organization was having financial troubles. He said he knew the ROC board would meet Tuesday to determine the fate of the shelter, which opened in 2011.
After Price learned that ROC, which sees about 125 clients a day, decided to shut down, he said he called an emergency board meeting.
“What we decided was it didn’t matter about Pathways,” Price said. “It didn’t matter about the ROC. What was important is the hundred people who come to the shelter every day, so our board unanimously said, ‘we’re going to take care of those people.’”
Price said Pathways will meet with representatives from the city, county, local businesses and churches to reach a consensus on how the day shelter will operate going forward.
“What’s important is that this is a wake up call for the community,” Price said. “We need a process. We need community-wide support from the city, county, churches to take care of these people. It’s going to be a growing problem as Rock Hill grows.”
Price said Pathways will keep two operating budgets — one for the day shelter and one for Pathways.
“We stand ready to do what we need to do,” Price said. “And it’s not in our budget, but we hope that the donors who are giving to the ROC today will give to us and if they specify that it’s for the day shelter, those funds have to be spent in that day shelter.”
The day shelter will have the same hours, open six days a week from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., and have a church service on Sunday mornings, Price said.
Iris Smalls-Hubbard, Renew Our Community’s executive director, will run the Pathways day shelter. Price couldn’t say if the other six ROC employees will work for the day shelter.
“As the city grows, property values go up and rents go up,” Price said. “That will make more people homeless. It’s all for the good of the community. And I think God has given us this wake up call. I think we needed it.”
This story was originally published October 23, 2019 at 3:23 PM.
