JACKSONVILLE, Fl. — As Northeast Florida braces for frigid temperatures, Jacksonville’s City Rescue Mission State Street location is opening its doors to 100 additional individual men, women and women with children beginning Friday, December 23, at 2:30 p.m. at 234 W State St.
A warm bed, hot meals, showers, clean clothes, “intensive case management services” and Christian-based counseling will be offered to those in need.
City Rescue Mission, Inc. is a 501(c)(3) corporation that offers food, clothing, shelter, emergency services and residential recovery programs to homeless men, women, and women with children. What began as an effort to provide “soup, soap and salvation” to alcoholics, has evolved to become a privately funded, nonprofit organization that helps rebuild the lives of the “homeless and needy.”
“Our goal is to help each person who walks through our doors to become a healthy, productive member of society,” they said.
Paul Stasi, the Mission’s Executive Director, says that despite the shelter being at capacity, the Mission will use the dining room as an overflow area. Mattresses will be placed on the floor and guests are welcomed to stay as long as the temperatures remain below 40 degrees - regardless of the time of day.
Stasi says that all services will be made available including “intensive case management services” to help navigate the homeless to become housed as well as an addiction recovery program.
Although the doors close at 4:30 p.m., Stasi said no one will be turned away.
“As far as coming later, either they can come on their own or if JSO brings them in any time of the night, we’ll take them,” he concluded.