Beth Israel High School Visits Project Save
By Lauren Pankiw
It was not the first time we had heard of Project Save nor was it the first time many of us had volunteered there, but nevertheless, the experience was unique: On Sunday October 2, the high school class of Beth Israel, The West Temple went to Project Save to help serve food to the homeless. I woke up at the crack of dawn and arrived at the Catholic Worker Storefront building in Cleveland at 7:30 am to rendezvous with the rest of my class. There, we waited with anticipation to help the founder and director, Carl Cook. Before that started, Carl roused us with his narrative of the plight of homelessness in Cleveland. We all huddled around Carl eagerly as he began speaking about the plight of the homeless. It was not a new story to me, but it was just as stirring all the same:
Folks don’t realize that there are many paths to homelessness in Cleveland. Of course, many of the men and women had succumbed to their pre-existing drug and alcohol problems and thus doomed themselves to end up on the streets. Many others had suffered a simple but devastating fate such as losing a job that tipped the scale in favor of misfortune. A select few had even willingly chosen a life on the streets, but these conditions are rare. I could tell that Carl was intimately familiar with all of these cases. He was a sincere and potent speaker, whose quiet air of confidence and purpose was tempered by an endearing humbleness that made everyone want to stand just a little closer to him. It didn’t occur to me that his likable personality had roots in a harrowing past—Carl himself was once homeless. He was raised in a privileged family, with successful parents who instilled the value of hard work in their children. However, despite these advantageous circumstances, Carl was sabotaged by his alcoholism, which first manifested before he had reached even the age of ten. But having overcome his own addiction, Carl decided to do something to help other people in his former same position and started Project Save.
Project Save has served over 10,000 families by serving breakfast on Sunday mornings. All the food is dependent on private donations and fundraising events. The Center also helps people with other basic needs like getting them birth certificates so they can apply for jobs and other services. I had never thought about these basic things because I had taken them for granted. Luckily for the homeless of Cleveland, Carl Cook does not. In addition to running Project Save, he also founded an organization called the Metanoia Project which provides care and serves food to homeless people who are afraid to come to shelters for any variety of reasons.
