Today we’d like to introduce you to Karlette Karras.
Hi Karlette, we’re thrilled to have a chance to learn your story today. So, before we get into specifics, maybe you can briefly walk us through how you got to where you are today?
Serenity’s Grace was literally started by the grace of Serenity. At 16 year old community servant. As a toddler, she showed much interest in community service, as it was a family activity. Often times our family would receive pushback for bringing a child to serve in the capacity that we were serving. After several incidents and having grown tiresome of the complaints, we began to pick and choose which service events would be most comfortable for our family to participate in. At the brilliant age of five years old, Serenity shared that she missed feeding the people and that pile of clothes our family had been collecting to donate needed to be given out.
After several conversations and begging and pleading to get into the community, we challenged her to get a team together and plan her dream event. She immediately took the phone and began calling our friends, neighbors, and family. We worked on what to name her team and then on creating a logo. She thought of her menu, and she went to work on setting up a day, time, and place. Our first outing was a hit. We fed over 100 people, gave clothes, blankets, shoes, drinks, and most importantly, lots of love. Our volunteers were so overjoyed, they planned for the next month without hesitation. With the support of friends, family, strangers and local businesses, we have grown tremendously. We now have a food pantry that provides over 500 people with food weekly. We are not the traditional pantry either. Our families come in and shop for their food and have choices. We even furnish apartments, connect people to jobs and connect people to resources to support their success and sustainability. We put the people in our community to work and have gained new family members by just helping people realize they are not alone.
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
Our biggest challenge has been financial support. While we have been blessed many times and are able to keep the doors of our pantry open, it is not always the easiest. We are housed in a building that needs major repairs and we lack the proper appliances and equipment to effectively serve the entire community. Majority of our funding has come from the efforts of our board members. We do have loyal donors and strangers that help us often as well. As we grow as a non-profit, we gain access to different resources to gain access to grant funding but we have not been able to create a consistent and substantial flow of money into our organization.
Thanks – so what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
Serenity’s Grace has done much work in the community and continues to do much. Before COVID-19, we did smaller projects with our smaller team, but our organization has grown tremendously due to the demand increase of families in need. At the peak of the pandemic, we filled our trucks almost everyday to feed the many families. Our work consisted of handing out hygiene kits, non-perishable meal kits, hot meals, getting families off the street, and getting furniture in the homes for these families, all while conducting our food pantry every Tuesday from 3:00 pm – 6:00 pm. We were overjoyed with the outreach and support from the community that allowed us to host large events and give away over 1,000 meals, blankets, toys, and essential items.
So maybe we end on discussing what matters most to you and why?
What matters most to us is ending homelessness, hunger, abuse, and hate. Our family grew up in a very inclusive environment. This meant people of all races, ethnicities, and classes coexisted and cared for one another. Understanding the importance of seeing a human and helping that human has been something that our family wants to encourage not only out community but the world to do. Today it is hard for many people to step outside of themselves to help and encourage people. Serenity’s Grace makes sure that we promote in all our endeavors, hoping that it will become contagious.
Contact Info:
- Email: ceo@serenitysgiftoflove.com
- Website: www.serenitysgiftoflove.com
