Education Matters | Building a Better Tomorrow: Harvest House’s New Life Enrichment Campus

By Ryan G. Van Cleave | August 2022

In 1992, Harvest House was founded by Pastors Jim and Peggy Minor to help men recover from substance abuse. While the pastors are officially retired, the Minor family is still running Harvest House 30 years later. Three of their five children work there, and the entire organization is run by their daughter, Erin Minor, “who grew up in the middle of four brothers.” As CEO, Erin oversees the organization’s supportive housing and hunger relief programs with 380 beds and multiple programs throughout Sarasota and Manatee Counties. They serve members of our community who are working to rebuild their lives, including families and youth experiencing homelessness, and adults with a history of addiction and incarceration. Erin’s also pleased that Harvest house is able to offer affordable rentals to low-income families. 

“Last year,” she explains, “we provided 116,781 bed nights. That means for every night that a head was in a bed of ours, that counted as 1.” Erin clarifies that all of Harvest House’s efforts—from providing housing to any other type of services—aren’t a handout but rather a hand-up to help people work toward independence. Getting people back on their feet and able to succeed on their own is always the goal. 

To meet the growing need in our community, Harvest House continually adds beds and expands their programming to serve different populations. Currently, they provide life enrichment activities to 150+ clients each, with 100 of them attending classes four nights a week despite Harvest House not having their own classroom space. 

That problem is about to be addressed because of the new Life Enrichment campus which is scheduled to be completed in September 2022. The plan to create Harvest House’s first infrastructure dedicated to wraparound services includes repurposing an existing 5,000 square foot space on the corner of Beneva Road and 17th Street and adding 11,000 square feet of additional space. This new campus will feature seven community-accessible administrative offices, two private spaces for community partners and therapy, four classrooms, lots of multipurpose space, childcare space for kids of all ages, a catering kitchen, and more. “It’s going to serve as the foundation for our next phase of growth in addition to allowing us to increase services to our current clients,” she says.

Other challenges remain, such as the growing need for family services. Housing in specific is a real issue for many families, so Erin is working on improving Harvest House’s ability to provide emergency shelter, transition rental housing, and permanent supportive housing. While families certainly need help, Harvest House has 96 beds dedicated for use by uninsured people recovering from drug and/or alcohol abuse. Many of those are coming directly from the prison system or jail. Erin notes that “many aren’t able to pay $10,000 a month to get addiction recovery services, so we work closely with the court system to pick people up when they’re leaving jail or actually get them court ordered to us in lieu of a jail or prison sentence. Here, they get the help they need—case management, classes, therapy, the ability to work. All of that instead of wasted time in jail.”

Harvest House is one of the few agencies that offers supportive housing, which is a round-the-clock commitment and not an office that does case management therapy 9 to 5 for five days a week. “We have crises at night, on holidays, on weekends,” Erin admits. “Homelessness and crises simply don’t wait for a Monday through Friday during business hours.”

Clearly, many people don’t realize the scope and depth of all Harvest House does. Once a month, they offer community tours. It takes about an hour to visit all their campuses, but for those who take the time to see it all firsthand, the Harvest House mission (“champion hope and transform lives through supportive and affordable, addiction recovery programs, and food security”) comes alive in an unforgettable way.

“Something that always surprises me is how resilient people are,” Erin says. “Hearing some of the horrors people have been through reminds me how strong and resilient the human spirit is. It’s a privilege that people trust us with their intimate details and to be with them on their journey.” Erin adds that she always says that Harvest House handles the fine China of people’s lives because they deal with crisis. But Erin and her colleagues do a great job with their compassionate support, guidance, and services, as well. 

“Lately, we’ve heard a lot of divisive rhetoric when it comes to politics or COVID,” Erin says. “And we’ve seen a lot of hurt, sadness, and anger over the last several years. People experienced a lot of pain.” That’s why the tagline for the Life Enrichment campus capital campaign has been “Building a place where the love is louder and the light is brighter.” As Erin says, Love IS louder than all of that. It’s also louder than shame, regret, or guilt.

Erin says, “We’re trying to bring community together and saying, Listen, we can do this. And we can focus on these things instead of some of these other things that are driving us crazy. We can move forward, but only if we can come together.” With the new Life Enrichment campus, it’ll be easier than ever for the community to join Harvest House in building a better tomorrow for everyone.

FOR MORE INFORMATION please visit www.harvesthousecenters.org or call 941.953.3154.