City Rescue Mission helps clients rise above circumstances with new café

For many, finding and sustaining work can be a challenge, putting people in what can often seem like a helpless position. However, Chamber member City Rescue Mission has risen to the occasion with the addition of Rise Café.

Rise Café is a social enterprise of City Rescue Mission that provides their clients with a real-world employment opportunity. Clients are able to readjust to the demands of sustaining work, while earning an income and learning essential skills for the future.

The café currently serves the downtown community, Monday through Friday, from 7 a.m. until 2 p.m. While customers will need to come in to order as of now, City Rescue Mission CEO and President Erin Goodin said she is working toward setting up an online, or app-based, ordering system for the future.

Rise Café was comprised from Goodin’s idea to develop the building that sits across from City Rescue Mission’s location along Reno Avenue into a social enterprise project. Pulling inspiration from projects like Take 2 in Tulsa – a café that works with women recently released from prison to build employment skills – Goodin organized a team in Oklahoma City to bring Rise Café to life. Goodin said that many of City Rescue Mission’s clients possess the skills needed to succeed, already. They simply need the opportunity to build upon them.

Kellie Sapp prepares an espresso drink.

“A lot of them, they have the skills, they’re just lacking the confidence. It’s been so long since they’ve been in employment, or in steady employment, so just feeling like they can do it again increases confidence,” Goodin said.

Staff members work alongside City Rescue Mission clients to facilitate the space. The tenure of each client with Rise Café is determined by individual needs, ranging anywhere from weeks to months.

Clients can learn to make espresso drinks and specialty coffees, about the history of coffee, and more while working in the café.

“It’s not just a guidance on how to make a coffee, or how to represent a company to your customers. It’s how to interact with your co-employees, your higher-ups, in a professional manner,” Kellie Sapp, a current client said.

“Some of us never learned how to properly speak our minds in a productive manner. I’m learning the foundation of communication all over again. So, when I have those fears, they walk me right through it. I know I have leadership tendencies, but there were little tweaks that needed to happen and I’m learning those things.”

The initiative also allows the community to take part in the restoration of their neighbors by supporting the café. Customers can interact with clients in an environment that is inviting of conversation.

“The community gets to come in, and they also get to feel good about serving and helping someone else that’s experiencing homelessness, breaking down that stigma of homelessness, thinking it’s just a drunk guy living under a bridge,” Goodin said. “They’re actually people just like you and I, that made a different decision, or had different circumstances in life that caused them to experience homelessness.”

Sapp said a traumatic experience at a former job led to her becoming anxious when interacting with customers, after working in customer service since the age of 14. The employment-induced anxiety held her back from working or finding new work.

“It doesn’t matter what you do, you’re doing customer service. It doesn’t matter if I’m in home healthcare, doesn’t matter if I’m working fast food, McDonald’s, it doesn’t matter,” Sapp said.

Rise Café has given Sapp a chance to redefine her outlook on employment, and the interactions that come with it. She credits the café with helping her to establish relationships with people she may have never crossed paths with, otherwise, by providing a subject of commonality in coffee.

“I’ve gotten to meet quite a few people that make a difference, and that’s been fun, to see what their minds think of. I like picking people’s brains. I’m not finding a shortage of that.”

Safaa Kadhim poses in positivity.

City Rescue Mission employee, Safaa Kadhim, agrees that one of the most important skills he has been able to build up through his time with Rise Café is customer service. Beginning his work for the mission as security, Kadhim has now transitioned his people skills into working at the café.

Kadhim immediately looks to be of service as customers enter Rise Café, expressing a positive energy and gratefulness for the opportunity to interact with his patrons.

“That’s my favorite work,” Kadhim said, “I’m a customer service person. I’m good with people. The goal [of the café] is to give customer service and to move our community to the next level and help the community.”

The café is currently working toward a summer menu that will help serve a broader audience. While the current menu includes options like a hot roast beef sandwich or ham and gruyere quiche, the summer menu will incorporate lighter options more appropriate for the rising temperatures.

“I’m hopeful within the next couple of weeks, we’re going to be able to retire some of our heavier items and replace them with some lighter options,” Rise Café General Manager Ronda Golden said. “While it is a simple menu, it is one that I am hopeful will encompass more people throughout the course of the summer.”

Golden said she would like to include at least one vegetarian option, as well as an option for people who do not eat pork in the upcoming menu. Regardless of the season, Golden says the real focus is the nourishment of our neighbors.

"They’re just like us. And we could be in their shoes. They could be in our shoes if our circumstances were just a little different.”

“Our purpose isn’t just to sell a good cup of coffee, and good menu. Our purpose is to actually help people and give them a set of skills that will enable them to better their lives when they step outside of these stores. That’s something you don’t see in most other coffee shops, is intention toward your employees."

You can find a full menu and more at www.cityrescue.org/risecafe.