Buffalo City Mission hosts ribbon-cutting ceremony for new community center

The Alfiero Family Center of Hope and Promise will provide community and preventative services, emergency shelter, transitional housing & recuperative care for homeless

With amount raised, City Mission officially exceeds $15 million goal for its ‘Next Century’ capital campaign

On Friday, the Buffalo City Mission officially opened its new Community Center at 100 E. Tupper St. Known as the Alfiero Family Center of Hope and Promise, the 75,000-square-foot facility will provide preventative services to those who are on the brink of homelessness and many already experiencing homelessness. Notable features include space for social service agencies, case management, education, mental health services, a recuperative care unit (the first of its kind in Western New York), medical care, job skills training, housing and career development, legal services, food and clothing.

Accompanying this news, the City Mission announced it has raised $15,124,374 as part of its “Next Century” capital campaign – exceeding the $15 million goal established in 2018 to support construction of the new site.

The announcements were part of a ribbon-cutting ceremony in the facility’s new welcome center. Buffalo City Mission leadership and staff were joined by elected officials, community donors and distinguished guests, including Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown; Darius Pridgen, senior pastor, True Bethel Baptist Church; Chris Alfiero, family member and executive director at Foundation 214; the Hon. Crystal Peoples-Stokes, New York State Assembly majority leader, 141st Assembly District; Danielle Shainbrown, Esq., president and chief business officer, McGuire Development Co.; the Hon. Timothy Kennedy, New York state senator, 63rd Senate District; Gary Quenneville, regional executive of the Upstate New York Region and president of the Buffalo Market, KeyBank; and Russell J. Salvatore, founder, Russell J. Salvatore Foundation.

“We are incredibly proud to open this new Community Center, which represents the work of countless individuals to support hope and healing for all,” said Stuart Harper, executive director and CEO of the Buffalo City Mission. “For more than 100 years, the City Mission and this community have embodied what it means to be a City of Good Neighbors. Today is a special moment for this effort, as we recognize our city’s resilience, generosity and collaboration to lift up the lives of our region’s poor and homeless.”

The Alfiero Family Center of Hope and Promise is part of the City Mission’s commitment to providing holistic services that help those in need in our community. In April 2018, the City Mission launched its capital campaign to support the facility’s end-to-end development.

The Community Center features four primary spaces, including:

√ Community and Preventative Services – A 9,300-square-foot community space – known as “The Center” – that features a state-of-the-art medical clinic staffed and managed by Jericho Road, mental health services, partner agency service access, case management, education, food and clothing pantry, and meals served 365 days a year.

√ Emergency Shelter – Expanding beyond the City Mission’s current space, this area is designed to significantly improve guests’ health and safety.

√ Transitional Housing – Built on the City Mission’s transitional housing program, this platform provides each individual with a pathway to a stable life through the agency’s holistic programing, education and skill training resources, to lift them out of poverty and onto a pathway to a better life. This area includes 13 resident suites, totaling 52 independent units, a chapel, educational classrooms and a computer lab – all designed to empower self-sufficiency for all guests.

√ Recuperative Care Unit – A dedicated space providing 13 hospital units, in collaboration with area health care providers, to extend home medical care to the physically and mentally ill following a discharge from a hospital.

"On behalf of the City of Buffalo, I congratulate the Buffalo City Mission and all involved in delivering this tremendous facility to our community," Mayor Brown said. "As our city continues to experience a transformation, which has included $7.8 billion in economic development activity since 2012, my administration continues to grow a Buffalo where opportunity thrives and where every resident has the tools to build successful lives. This new Community Center, and the programming it provides, show how we are building an inclusive, innovative and supportive community together that leaves no one behind."

The Buffalo City Mission thanked the entire community for the “generosity, collaboration and commitment” in making a new center possible.

As a continual effort, the City Mission’s ongoing “pick-a-brick” campaign allows individuals and organizations to make a lasting legacy gift – helping to continue to expand the “Pathway to Hope and Healing” into the next century. To pick a brick today, or to learn more, visit pickabrick.org.

To learn more about the Alfiero Family Center of Hope and Promise, or to sign up for a personal tour of the new facility, visit buffalocitymission.org/nextcentury.

The Buffalo City Mission, founded in 1917, is a nonprofit organization providing preventative, emergency and transitional housing programs to thousands of people who are homeless and impoverished every year. This includes a women and children’s shelter (Cornerstone Manor), the Men’s Community Center, and the Dick Road thrift store to serve the Western New York community. For more information, visit buffalocitymission.org, call 716-854-8181, follow on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/BuffaloCityMission and Twitter at https://twitter.com/CityMission.