Urban Fuel Updates

Our Board of Directors currently consists of Doug Burns, Cheryl Eads (Board Secretary), Josh Eads (Treasurer, Cheryl's son), Ed Gratton (Chairman), Ed Provident (Vice-chair) and myself (Executive Director). Minutes of our meetings are available.

After the end of the year we'll be sending financial reports to our suppoerts. If you would like to receive one, you may email me at jim.herbst@verizon.com.

Pennsylvania did approve us for sales tax exemption.

Donations can be sent to Urban Fuel; 118 Glen Caladh St.; Pittsburgh PA 15207

The bad news is that after 3 months of promotion, we didn't get any of the intended students signed up for the Leadership Lab program. It was, in my opinion, a reality check of how unknown and disconnected we (Urban Fuel) and the church are among the people we want to reach. We could have filled the slots with already churched kids but that isn't our purpose. My gut feeling is that people don't feel comfortable enough with us yet to commit to a 9 month program.

The good news is that the pressure to operate the Leadership Lab is off and we can focus on special events on a monthly basis. The Board discussed and approved holding a series of concerts, parties and other special events to build our familiarity in the neighborhood - beginning with our Grand Opening. See above. We will pay students to staff the coffee house events - $40 per night (3 hours) plus a $10 bonus if they do well and recruit people to come. The grand opening will have a hip hop theme. Some teen heavy metal bands have asked to use the building so we'll turn that into an event. We'll do a neighborhood talent show and a jazz Christmas coffee house. You get the idea. We'll see how things go before returning the Leadership Lab.

Through the generous donations of our donors, the New Life Campaign inside the church, and our hard working work groups, we were able to make the church basement much more coffee house friendly. Combined with the church, we've invested about $10,000 in renovations and equipment. We've held off on buying much furniture because the area Starbucks Manager said they would consider donating their used furniture to us the next time they renovate a store.
I felt overwhelmed the other day taking pictures as I thought of all the people who have helped us - from middle schoolers to a senior Sunday school class. We've been very blessed!

Two dimensional low resolution pictures hardly capture the work, sweat and money people have invested into our church basement but I wanted to try. In May we started with a 25+ year old kitchen (since its last renovation), boring paint, little counter space, a rusted out steel sink and two 20+ year old refrigerators. The refrigerator part on the one refrigerator couldn't keep food below the required 41 degrees and the freezer on the other one was so frozen over there were only about 6 square inches of usuable space left. Someone covered the original (c. 1921) cabinet countertops with big floor tile creating very unsanitary cracks and crevices (a food saftey no no) that also looked disgusting. Like many church kitchens it was cluttered with everyone's used kitchen junk, dull knives, mismatched utensils and various discarded useless gadgets. Two of our ladies filled three garbage bags. The stage had a pea green carpet and had become yet another repository of junk. It only had 1 two prong outlet that was being used to support all kinds of sound equipment and lights.

Leo Lavin brought another work group up from Severn Christian Church outside Baltimore. They took up the stage carpet, finished the stage painting, replaced the front stage molding, prepared and painted the front cement, re-painted the back windowsills, painted around the track lighting, cleaned the nursery, picked out curtains, installed the men's bathroom vanity and served food to about 20 neighbors. Leo preached. A few Baltimore Ravens fans were even gracious enough to paint our van roof Steeler colors-reigning NFL champs. Thanks Greg, Jess, A.J., Larry, Chuckee, Christina, Allison, Chad, Cody, Karen, Donna and Leo! I had a great time.