FareStart
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
FareStart is a non-profit organization in Seattle, Washington, USA, that operates a unique program to help get the homeless off the street. It was started as a regular soup kitchen, but its founders then realized that, if they trained their clients to help prepare the food, it would give them the job skills they would need to find employment and stable housing. FareStart reports that 80% of graduates find jobs upon graduation, and keep them for at least three months.
Local shelters, low-income daycare providers, and senior centers (many at least partially funded by the city of Seattle) have helped FareStart achieve economies of scale, as well as a predictable revenue stream in a typically unpredictable industry, by contracting with FareStart to provide institutional-scale meals for their clients.
The main FareStart Restaurant and the FareStart administrative offices are housed in Downtown Seattle just east of the Pike Place Market. The restaurant serves lunch Monday through Friday, and every Thursday night serves a special dinner, with the food preparation supervised by a "guest chef"--a noted Seattle chef from another restaurant that volunteers his or her services to support the cause. Chefs have come from as far as the Rosario Resort on Orcas Island, but most are from some of the best known restaurants in Seattle and King County, including Ray's Boathouse, Sky City at the Space Needle, Salty's on Alki, Elliott's Oyster House, and the Metropolitan Grill.
The students that staff the restaurant are provided a comprehensive, 16-week training program that includes everything from safe and proper food storage and catering to kitchen vocabulary and kitchen math. Many other skills are also covered, including conflict management, life management, employment goal-setting, résumé writing, and job-interview skills.
The original FareStart Café was at the Seattle campus of Antioch University, but in June 2004 moved to a building in the Rainier Valley neighborhood that also houses non-profits like Treehouse, The Mockingbird Society, Washington Women's Foundation, and Northwest Children's Fund. The newest FareStart Café opened in May 2004 in the new Seattle Central Library. It is the only food service in the library. The cafés serve as on-the-job training sites for FareStart students enrolled in the Youth Barista Training Program, a joint effort with YouthCare since September 2003. It is an eight-week program for those aged 14 to 21.
In addition to the food preparation training, FareStart also provides job placement assistance, help finding housing if the student is not already staying at a homeless shelter, and continues working with the students after they start their new job to help them keep it.
FareStart also provides catering services, using the food they prepare.
