A Salvation Army location in Farmington is planning to turn itself into a resource center that will help families, seniors and the homeless.
Deacon Dean, the administrative assistant at the Farmington location, told KOB 4 that the current thrift store will be renovated and expanded.
“We have plans drawn up to basically have about seven to eight offices in there,” Dean said. “We are going to have a lounge area where they can charge their phones read a book get on a computer to put in job applications.”
The plans are designed to help meet the growing needs of a community looking to the Salvation Army for help.
“The number of people that we serve every day has more than tripled maybe quadrupled since I’d say the last six months,” Dean said. “It’s gotten extremely bad where we are serving a lot of people, we also do snack bags and hygiene kits for the homeless and that’s probably gone up 10-fold.”
The renovation will begin with landscaping and a paint job, including murals from Luke Paul.
“Basically our campaign is called take back the corner,” Dean said. “Eventually, what we would like to do is see the whole street get revitalized and take back Broadway so that it's part of the community again.”
Dean said the projects could take a couple of years to complete, but services such as free clothing and food boxes are available. The organization also needs volunteers to assist in holiday events such as providing meals for the homeless for Thanksgiving and bell ringers for the Christmas season.