After 35 years it’s time for a change. As homelessness and financial inequality grows, we need to grow to meet the needs of the people experiencing it. You can help.
During Hurricane Ida in 2021, our base of operations sustained significant flood damage. Despite substantial repairs, the building's infrastructure has never fully recovered. With the building in a flood zone, and knowing it would experience a similar issue the next time a major storm hit, we chose not to take on costly renovations that could effect our ability to provide consistent, reliable services for our outreach guests. Due to the flood damage we have now encountered an unforeseen issue with a rodent presence in the building. We took immediate action to ensure the safety of our team, volunteers, and the integrity of our services and we are no longer using our space in Elizabeth, NJ for any program operations. Our top priority has always been the well-being of everyone involved with City Relief and providing the highest quality services to the people we serve.
Fortunately, we were already in the early stages of exploring a new, permanent location in Clifton, NJ that is currently under construction. This unexpected development has accelerated our search for a temporary space until the Clifton building is ready, which we expect to be completed in Spring/Summer 2024. Our dream is that this new space isn’t just a base of program operations, but becomes a mobilization center for media initiatives, training, and other leadership development.
WHAT COMES NEXT?
This new base of operations will allows us to immediately expand our operations at a cost savings in three significant ways:
Parking: We will finally have a safe place to park our vehicle fleet and not rely on an outside provider. It will allow quick and easy access to each vehicle saving us time and money.
Storage: Our storage space will also move from a rental area to in-house which will allow us easier access without the overhead of renting.
Industrial Kitchen: The increase in kitchen space will make it easier to prepare “The Best Soup in New York City” and will make the addition of coffee a much faster process during morning prep.
Sponsorships of our new building available starting at $10,000. Please contact our Sr. Director of Strategy and Advancement, Jessica Wright, at jess@cityrelief.org for more details.