Renewal Ranch Receives Home Depot Grant

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Renewal Ranch receives $20K Home Depot grant

By Courtney Spradlin
Created 2/22/10 5:37 pm
Renewal Ranch, a faith-based recovery program for men struggling with addiction, will receive a $20,000 grant from the Home Depot Foundation.

The grant, in the form of building materials, will help the organization, according to James Loy, director, build their first bunk house.

The nonprofit organization is in its final stages of acquiring the deed to a 94-acre piece of property, located just inside Perry County, to be a building site for the ministry. Renewal Ranch, modeled after John 3:16 Ministries in Charlotte, will begin with six men.

John 3:16 Ministries, according to Loy, began with three men and has since expanded to about 60. He and other leaders hope to expand the ministry in time.

The initial building of the first bunk house should take place in the next few months, Loy said.

The event will be a Team Depot event, in which Home Depot employees volunteer to construct the first bunk house from donated materials. Stoby’s Restaurant will provide breakfast and lunch to workers.

Loy said the regional manager, Gary Metheny, and other store managers have agreed to participate in the event.

The grant, Metheny said, will be given in two parts. “We will donate $10,000 in material now and $10,000 later. This will help them get started,” Metheny said. “We are supporting them as a local nonprofit organization to help improve the physical health of people in the neighborhood. It fits right in with what we do in the Home Depot Foundation.”

“The grant will greatly reduce the process cost and get our building site off the ground,” Loy said.

Fresh Start Ministries, headed by Larry Pillow, has implemented a fundraising program titled BAA, or Buy an Acre, which allows sponsorship of an acre of land at the ranch.

Loy said in order for Renewal Ranch to operate, they need commitments from community members. “There’s no government or state funding because the curriculum is religiously based. We need organizations, churches and individuals to help us,” Loy said. Loy is presenting to local churches in an effort to gain support for Renewal Ranch. “I think it (Renewal Ranch) will have a tremendous impact in the community. Addiction is tearing up families. It greatly effects communities in a negative way through crime, broken families and burdens on the taxpayer,” Loy said. “Recovery programs cost money. It costs $135 a day to house a man in the Arkansas Department of Correction. We’ve estimated a cost of $33 a day to house a man in our program.” The grant, provided by the Home Depot Foundation, is classified as a Community Impact Grant, and part of Home Depot’s Core Values, which is to give back to the community.