Mobile Shower Update

Today we trained five members of St. Anne’s, Oceanside including three student nurses and a faculty member. David, after visiting the medical clinic, became our first and for now only guest to take a shower. He was a little bewildered by the eight people greeting him, but on leaving he gave us a thumbs up and asked if he could tell others about the ministry.

Ruth Ann Lee, coordinator of the ministry team at St. Anne’s, and the Rev. Larry Hart, with the help of Mary Baker, nursing faculty member, were prepared, enthusiastic, and proved that starting at St. Anne’s was a great idea. The shower trailer performed magnificently. We learned a lot with David’s help on how we should set up and process guests. Next Thursday we will put what we learned into practice.

On Thursday, March 13, we will train any interested volunteers at 10 a.m. We will open for guests from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. each Thursday thereafter. We anticipate an increasing turnout as we’ve informed other organizations serving persons who are homeless that we are open. Although these organizations know of the ministry, we’ve held off until we knew that everything worked. After the Office of the Bishop moves to the Episcopal Church Center (ECC) in Ocean Beach, we will start offering showers there on Saturdays.

It is our intention to have the trailer on display at the next Service Coalition Summit on Saturday, April 26, at All Souls’, Point Loma. We have been invited to visit several parishes. Within our capabilities of time and availability of drivers we’ll start to schedule visits in May. Parishes can participate by sending volunteers to St. Anne’s and ECC and collecting items for hygiene packets (e.g. tooth brush, tooth paste, floss, comb, tissue packet, etc.).  Parishes with thrift shops could send clean usable clothes, especially socks, so that once clean our guests can put on clean clothes. It will be some time before we can consider making the trailer available to parishes participating in the Interfaith Shelter rotation.

Feel free to pass the word and help recruit more volunteers for both St. Anne’s and the ECC. We need drivers experienced in towing RV trailers who would commit to assist one day a month to move the trailer between Oceanside and Ocean Beach.