The Resurrection House Family Service Center was established in 1981 for the purpose of providing needed social and counseling services to residents of East and West Harlem, New York. It was acknowledged that a great number of disadvantaged Community Members suffered needlessly due to a lack of available social programs and a lack of understanding of how to take advantage of existing ones. The Resurrection House Family Service Center was created to help address this problem.

• As time pasted, however, it was quickly discovered that there was a far greater and devastating crisis facing these communities. Men, women, and children were going to bed hungry. To our surprise, a  major complaint of clients was that of not having enough to eat. Parents often bitterly complained that they regularly didn’t have food to feed their children and how they often went without. The situation was the same for our elder population. Hunger and its related ills were harsh realities that could not be escaped and had to be addressed. Because of this, the Resurrection House Family Service Center quickly changed its focus to providing emergency food assistance for community members and their families. This became one of our major priorities.

• A Food Pantry was established were community members were given free packages of food on a monthly basis. The size of their packages were dependent upon family size and  composition. Similarly, a Soup Kitchen was established that provided community members with hot and cold meals twice a week and every other Saturday. Social services, counseling, referral, and advocacy services were used to assist community members become self-sufficient.

The Resurrection House Family Service Center has been providing these services more than 26 years now, with an emphasis on self-reliance. It continues to do so today. Disadvantaged community members have come to depend upon the services we provide and we are proud to say that we have made a difference in their lives. We hope to expand our services in the very near future.