Streetlight Coffee House method in Tarentum has goal to change lives – Tribune

Updated 7 hours ago

Before Sandra Tidwell embarked on her 12.5-hour expostulate to Alabama final Wednesday, she stopped by a Streetlight Coffee House along West Seventh Avenue in Tarentum.

She wanted Denise and Mark Johnston to urge with her.

“I’m about to take a tour on a road, and they gave me their blessings,” Tidwell said. “I’m carrying to go down South. I’m carrying a personal family matter.”

Tidwell is a visit caller to a Streetlight Coffee House, during 203 W. Seventh Ave.

The name might dope you, as a storefront isn’t unequivocally a coffeehouse.

It’s indeed a village method and overdo center.

It does offer coffee, though. And soup.

But distinct during a standard coffeehouse, a offerings are free.

“I’ve had people contend given we’ve remodeled that we should have something on a daily basement and usually assign a tiny volume for coffee or soup or whatever … though we don’t wish to do that,” pronounced Denise Johnston, a executive of a ministry.

“People have said, ‘Why do we usually give it away?’ And a usually thing we can tell them that in a Bible, Jesus openly gave.”

Streetlight is open a second Saturday of any month from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m.

The method has been around for 5 years.

It’s run by Church during a Heights in Pine, where a Johnstons are elders. They offer as a ministry’s directors.

“Our idea was to come into a village and kind of bond churches as good as a people,” pronounced Denise Johnston, 63, of Oakmont. “Sometimes people are in dim places in their life and a light that Jesus can move saves people from hopelessness. People on a street, and there’s a light of Christ.

“So it’s called a Streetlight Coffee House. The observant underneath it (the sign) is, ‘helping people, changing lives.’”

A weekend of goal work led a Johnstons’ church to Tarentum, where members saw a need for an overdo center.

Owner donated building, paid to reconstruct

Former church member Rick Burk coincidentally owned a building in a area. He also had dreams of opening a coffeehouse, so a goals went hand-in-hand.

He donated a building, that housed a former Sallade’s Bar, to a church for free. He picked out a name and his daughter designed a logo.

When it finally came time to reconstruct a place, he paid a $15,000 for that, too.

“Me and my mother unequivocally believed that (this) was something we were ostensible to do,” pronounced Burk, 65, of Middlesex Township. “It doesn’t make clarity financially … though during this indicate it’s working. It looks great, and we have some ideas of what we wish to do with it.”

The renovations took place progressing this year and have unequivocally done a building pop.

Workers tore out a bar and combined dual coffee bars. They put in a new wooden floor, bound adult an bureau and bathroom, embellished a ceilings, commissioned new lighting and spruced adult a kitchen.

Burk paid for a materials and volunteers representation in a homogeneous of about $40,000 value of work.

“It was unequivocally a blessing,” Burk said. “Every day (they) went there. All they did was call me and contend here’s what we need.”

Streetlight serves 30 to 90 people a month of all ages and walks of life.

Older group have come in looking for pants, shirts and jackets. Children stop by for a play of soup or some mac and cheese.

Roughly 100 people uncover adult for incomparable celebrations, like holidays, when a method gives out giveaway goodies like full Thanksgiving dinners and Christmas toys.

Not a church, not a coffeehouse: A haven, maybe

Before a renovations visitors would come to a bar to get food, that is supposing during a monthly gatherings.

Now they can lay during dozens of tables and be served by volunteers.

The interior has a feel of a coffeehouse/restaurant.

Dozens of framed photos of streetlights hang on a walls and a dining tables are accented with centerpieces and candles. Multicolored couches with musical chuck pillows are set adult subsequent to a coffee bars.

There’s also a television, a cupboard filled with games, and a cruise list where kids can do crafts.

In a back, there’s a vast temporary closet where visitors can emporium around and collect out clothes.

“It’s awesome,” Burk said. “People are dumbfounded when they open a pathway and demeanour in there.”

The method has stood by Tidwell by cancer, surgeries and depression. It has given her hope, and she thinks of a Johnstons and a other visitors as a second family.

She even pronounced she would hit them on reaching her end in Alabama.

“They have seen me by a journey,” Tidwell said.

It’s also a elite end for some.

It’s not a church, though people consider of it as one.

Once, a family had a choice of going to an Easter egg hunt or to “the church.” They chose a church.

“A lot of people would never substantially beauty a pathway of a church, though they’ll come here,” pronounced Mark Johnston, 66, of Oakmont. “I theory we would like it to be as we consider it is: a port-in-the-storm place.”

Those helped assistance others

Because all was donated to them, a method encourages a visitors to present to others in a community.

People have positively delivered.

“The people here come, and they not usually take — though they give,” Denise Johnston said. “They will come in with food, canned goods. I’ve had to ask them to stop since we would come and a whole pathway would be (filled with) bags of clothes.”

Despite that, they never spin divided donations. No matter what they are.

One time, a male came in with a unwashed plate strainer. Denise Johnston didn’t know who would wish it, though took it anyway.

It came as a warn when someone indispensable it.

“I never reject anything that they move since it’s their approach of giving,” Johnston said. “It has been really absolute and we’ve seen a lot of changes in a community.”

“It’s overwhelming on so many levels,” Mark Johnston said.

Madasyn Czebiniak is a Tribune-Review staff writer. Reach her during 724-226-4702, mczebiniak@tribweb.com, or on Twitter @maddyczebstrib.