Agency Details:

Backstreet Missions Inc.

Backstreet Missions, Inc. is a not-for-profit faith-based organization dedicated to helping the homeless and hurting, rescuing people where they are by offering practical helps in the form of food, shelter, and clothing but most importantly, hope in place of despair, encouragement in place of discouragement, friendship when they have been abandoned by others and knowledge that their life has purpose and meaning.

Description:
The Mission provides a 28-bed shelter for homeless men, another facility for up to 11 women and 20 children. Geno's Cafeteria "soup kitchen" serves free prepared meals to the public 6 days a week as well as weekend meals to the handicapped and home-bound. The Thrift Store offers a low-cost alternative to the community. A Food Pantry/Assistance outreach provides canned food, clothing, household and furniture to those in destitute situations. Thanksgiving baskets are given out each year and the Adopt-A-Child" Christmas program assists families with gifts for their children.

History:
The Mission began in 1995 in Spencer, In with the first men's shelter, moved to Bloomington, In. on Smith Pk in 1998 until the opening of the current men's shelter "Upper Room" on May 6, 2002. The Thrift Store and Food Pantry started in 1997 on Patterson Dr and moved in 2000 to it's current location at 1928 Arlington Rd in Bloomington, In. "Agape House" women's shelter opened in 1998 and the larger facility opened on W. 3rd St. on March 10, 2008. Geno's Cafeteria "soup kitchen" began in 2002.
The desire to start the Mission began when the founder Gene Kelley had an encounter with a homeless man in San Diego, CA in 1979. This story is dramatized on the website: www.backstreet.org

Contact person: Linda Kelley, Executive Director, (phone), (email)

Office fax number: (812) 333-3005

Address:

PO Box 3297 Bloomington, IN 47402

Web Site: http://www.backstreet.org

Last updated on October 8, 2009