By Joe Jarosz
Northeast News
September 17, 2014

KANSAS CITY, Missouri – Michael Mayberry has big goals for the Grace United Community Ministries.

Mayberry, the executive director for the church, set forth those plans last November when he contacted The Land Bank of Kansas City to request ownership of the former Tropics Car Wash located behind the church, at 801 Benton Blvd.

“They liked the proposal that we presented,” Mayberry said, adding it took about 10 months to complete the process and paperwork. “We closed it on Aug. 28. We’re very excited about it because we have big plans for it.”

The reasoning behind taking over the property, Mayberry said, was twofold. First and foremost, its an eyesore to the community. To his understanding, the land is a haven for drug use, illegal dumping and criminal activity.

“We get reports that a lot of crime happens in the area,” Mayberry said, adding most of the issues take place at night. “It just didn’t sit well with us and what we’re trying to do here at the church. We want the church to be the model organization of the community.”

Secondly, he said the church wants to give children a safe place to play. Ideally, the the car wash would be demolished, the land cleaned up and repaved and a playground with extra church parking would be constructed in its place. A second, smaller playground could also eventually be added, too, between the church and parsonage.

“When the kids are outside right now, we have complete strangers walking through kickball games and soccer game,” Mayberry said. “When we have guests over, like funders, or hire new folks, we want to make sure they also feel safe.”

Cleaning of the site will begin in a couple of weeks, with the demolition soon to follow. Mayberry said it will take between $125,000 and $150,000 in funding to complete the project, which they expect to have close to completion by this time next year.

“It is what it is, but it doesn’t have to be this way and this is an opportunity to do something good for the community,” Mayberry said.

Currently, the church has over 150, skilled labor volunteers Mayberry pointed out, to help with the cleaning, demolition and eventual construction. The church will need funding and Mayberry said they will soon begin fundraising via a capital campaign, a type of fundraising that works through outreach activities focused on raising money for a specific defined need.

“What we’re going to do is identify funders who will be willing to partner with us to fund the project,” Mayberry said. “We don’t know who they are right now. We’re in the process of identifying who those people might be and we’re working with Support KC to help us with the fundraising strategy.”

The demolition and playground is just the beginning of Mayberry’s goals for the church. Ideally, he’d like to create a church campus for the community. The vacant apartment building at 817 Benton Blvd. shares land with the church, and eventually they’d like to try and acquire that land for its goal.

“We want benches, trees planted and a new garden,” Mayberry said. “We want this to be the model organization for the community and if anything needs to be torn down to help make this community look better, then we’ll work towards that end. We’ll work with the neighborhood associations and other organization boards to make the Northeast Community the best community it can be. If that means tearing things down that are an eyesore to the community, we’ll do that.”

The vision with the campus is to expand its education for children and families in the community. The church offers programs for children including after school tutoring, summer camp and teen enrichment programs for children. Mayberry said the church is also in the process of offering GED classes and ESL classes for adults. These are in addition to the food pantry and emergency assistance programs currently offered by the church.

“We are focused on educating the entire family,” Mayberry said.

With the goals the church has, Mayberry said it isn’t something they can do alone. A number of organizations are going to have to come together to help facilitate this dream.

“The good news is people want to see change and I don’t think it’ll be difficult to rally people to help us with this project,” Mayberry said. “It going to be a beautiful project and a project the community will benefit from. We want to attract more people to the church and neighborhood and Northeast.”

If you’d like to offer your support to the project, either financially or through volunteering, you can contact Mayberry at 816-786-5787 or stop by the church.