Community Outreach

NNEMAP Item of the Month

NNEMAP Food Pantry is a cooperative ministry of over 30 churches distributing food and material assistance to needy residents of the near northside of Columbus. NNEMAP’s primary mission always will be to feed the hungry in our neighborhood, and to provide nutritious food for their tables. We have grown our children’s services and healthcare partnerships because we know that the hungry have many other issues in their lives. NNEMAP is in a unique position to be that welcoming and supportive environment where we can provide a broader range of services and become a bridge to those resources in our community who can solve those problems. That is our vision.

NNEMAP serves area neighbors in need. Our services include distributing back-to-school supplies, grooming kits at Christmas, providing Christmas gifts and holiday baskets to families during the holidays, and offering healthcare to clients through Columbus Public Health Department and the Breathing Association.

King Avenue UMC plays a significant role in our ministry. It provides financial support, donation of food, plays a primary role in our school supply and Christmas tree projects, and provides a dozen volunteers!

Each month, the NNEMAP Food Pantry requests churches to donated an "Item of the Month" to help our hungry neighbors. The designated item will be announced at church, found in our announcement sheet, and shared in the weekly King Avenue E-News Digest. Stay tuned to the weekly announcements for other opportunities to support NNEMAP.

For more information, contact Roy Clark, Director of NNEMAP Food Pantry at 614-297-0533 or director@nnemappantry.org. 

Grocery Help for Immigrant Families

Our Helpers is a women-led nonprofit dedicated to improving the lives of immigrant and refugee families in Central Ohio. They especially serve families who have already been impacted by losing a family member in immigration action. Many folks are afraid to leave their homes or register their names. Our Helpers is filling that gap. 

To support this valuable organization, we will be collecting grocery items for local immigrants. You can drop off any of these items at church on Sundays or anytime the church office is open. Look for the bin marked Our Helpers. 

Learn more at ourhelpers.org. 

For a downloadable grocery list, CLICK HERE.

King Avenue packs lunches for the Open Shelter on several Tuesdays and Thursdays throughout the year. All hands on deck for packing 200-400 lunches at a time! Check the schedule, and join when you're able. All days/dates are 6:00pm in the King Avenue kitchen. Many hands make light work! 

For the 2026 Lunch Packing schedule, CLICK HERE.

Calling all cooks, servers, and hostesses! Gates Fourth UMC serves a monthly community breakfast at 119 E. Gates St. King Avenue assists the Gates Fourth team with greeting guests, distributing clothing/personal care donations, serving meals, assisting in the kitchen, and cleaning up. 

For more information on getting involved, please contact Shawn Compton at comptonlaw@msn.com or (614) 378-6758 or simply show up to Gates Fourth on the fourth and/or fifth Saturday of each month from from 8:00-11:00am to enjoy a meal with your neighbors. 

The dress code for this food service environment is casual, but please wear closed-toes shoes for safety. 

The only skills needed for this three-hour commitment are to smile and bring hospitality to this diverse community. 

We hope to see you there! 

Gates Fourth United Methodist Church

119 E. Gates St.

Columbus, OH 43206

Partnership with Casa de Misericordia

Casa de Misericordia is a children's home in Piedras Negras, Coahuila, Mexico. King Avenue has been in partnership with Casa de Misericordia since 2007 and has sent at least one mission team per year ever since, along with ongoing financial support. On these trips, we serve the children and the Casa staff by eating with them, playing games with the kids, helping with maintenance and construction projects as needed, making a few meals for them, and worshiping with them. The people we send from King Ave experience the love of God in action through how their staff and local volunteers care for the children day in and day out. The children experience the love of God through these people who come to serve them from miles and miles away.

Casa de Misericordia's mission is to provide a loving, safe, God-centered home for abused, neglected, and homeless children in Piedras Negras. Some of these children return to their families when the home situation becomes more stable; others stay until they are able to live on their own or with a distant relative. The children need to know that someone loves them and cares for them. The Casa gives them that love, gives them a safe place to live, and connects them with the local schools. The Casa is funded almost entirely by private donations, from partner churches in Mexico and in the U.S. Our support of the Casa, both through our trips and ongoing financial support, makes a tangible difference in the lives of these children and the adults who care for them.

Contact Gwendolyn DeRosa (gwen@kingave.org) or Pastor Andy (andy@kingave.org) for more information.

King Avenue UMC and Hilliard Adopt-A-House (HAAH) Partnership, a Habitat for Humanity Affiliate

Excitement is starting to build for King Avenue’s latest community outreach ministry!  Starting with the 2015 build season, KAUMC has decided to join the Hilliard Adopt-A-House (HAAH) affiliate of Habitat for Humanity MidMidOhio.  Hilliard Adopt-A-House is a non-profit 501(c)3 charity that is one of six local church partnerships that annually build or renovate houses for deserving low income Central Ohio families.  Established in 1996, HAAH consists of Hilliard UMC, Indian Run UMC of Dublin, St. Brendan the Navigator Catholic Church and St. James Lutheran Church.  Over the past 19 years this dedicated group has built eleven new homes and also rehabilitated eight others.

Habitat for Humanity International is an ecumenical Christian housing ministry. Habitat affiliates work locally in communities around the world to select and support homeowners, organize volunteers, and coordinate house building. Since it’s founding in 1976, Habitat has built more than 400,000 homes worldwide, providing shelter for more than 1 million people in nearly 90 countries. In the Central Ohio community, Habitat has built more than 315 homes since 1987.  In 2014 HfHMO built 14 new homes and rehabbed 6 other homes, providing safe, affordable housing for 20 families who have a total of 35 children.

Habitat for Humanity interviews and selects families who earn 30 to 60% of the local median income level.  They also work with local municipalities to secure vacant or abandoned properties, so in addition to benefitting the partner families, we are also improving the neighborhoods where they will live.  The money to supply the needed materials, tools and professional services comes from private and corporate donors, faith based organizations, local build affiliates like HAAH and mortgage payments from current Habitat homeowners.  The partner families who will eventually take possession of the homes are required to take classes on finance and home maintenance (provided by HfHMO) and put in at least 100 hours of “sweat equity” to help build their own homes.  After taking possession of the homes the families agree to live in the homes for at least 10 years and make interest free mortgage payments.  Habitat for Humanity is proud to say that they don’t offer people a handout, they offer them a hand up!

So what kind of people volunteer to help build these houses?  Naturally, do-it-yourselfers and home handymen are drawn to this type of work, but Habitat crews consist of people from all walks of life.  The Hilliard Adopt-A-House volunteer crew consists of:

• A “house lead” who has been involved in over a dozen home builds.  He plans each work session and coordinates with HfHMO to make sure we have the tools and materials we need each week.

• Several “crew leads” who are also very experienced in building Habitat homes.  These folks lead small groups of 3 to 4 people to do various small jobs that are assigned to their crews by the house lead.  In addition to being knowledgeable and focused on their assignments, they are also there to teach their crews how to perform the work and make sure the work meets our high standards.

• A safety supervisor whose primary job is to make sure that everyone is working safely and following Habitat’s work practice guidelines.  Habitat for Humanity is fully OSHA compliant now and HAAH provides all needed safety glasses, hard hats, gloves, harnesses and other items to make sure that everyone goes home as healthy as they were when they came to the building site.  All volunteers who work on the site have to be at least 16 years of age and everyone has to wear closed toes shoes while working.  The safety supervisor also spends time during the day taking pictures of the workers and the house progress, and HAAH’s website is updated weekly with the pictures.  Check them out at www.hilliardhabitat.org!

• Volunteers workers of course!  Absolutely no prior experience is necessary and we often have new volunteers who have never hammered a nail into a piece of wood.  Each week there are a variety of types of work that are done, so volunteers have a lot of freedom to work on things that they feel comfortable doing or things that they would like to learn how to do.  Don’t like climbing ladders?  That’s okay, as we’re also planting trees today.  Is your shoulder ailing you today and you don’t want to lift drywall?  That’s okay also, as we’re building some shelving in the nice cool basement.  Scared of electricity?  No problem, as Habitat hires out work like roofing, plumbing, concrete pouring, electrical work and air conditioning to licensed contractors.

• Lunch providers.  HAAH generally works each Saturday and Wednesday, weather and home football games permitting!  On Saturdays the five member churches take turns providing lunch for the crew.  Some days we have cold cut sandwiches, chips and brownies, and on other days the “church basement ladies” outdo themselves and bring casseroles, pasta salads and homemade apple pie!  Wednesdays tend to have a smaller staff of retirees and young adults who are off of school for the summer, and on those days folks bring a bag lunch to the site.

If you are interested in learning more about King Avenue’s newest mission work with Habitat for Humanity, or know that you want to volunteer your time and talents to this effort, please contact our coordinator Trena Brown at trenabrown.31@gmail.com. In order to see specific information about an ongoing project, sign up to volunteer to work, or check the project calendar, visit the Hilliard Adopt-A-House (HAAH) website.  Working with Habitat for Humanity is fun, satisfying and a great way to learn new skills… and practice them on someone else’s house!

Many of us already use social media and photography to share life’s moments with friends and family. The King Avenue Buzz Team is an opportunity to use those same skills and platforms to capture authentic moments from our community and help create positive energy and excitement around King Avenue.

Real moments tell our story far better than anything we could stage. While one staff member can’t be everywhere, together we can capture and share the life, energy, and authentic community of King Avenue through photography and social media. Every photo, video, and post helps people see what life here is really like and picture themselves being part of it. This is a flexible ministry with no meetings, support when you need it, and the potential to make a huge impact. We need you!

In partnership with Ohio State University outreach, King Avenue has a free Narcan vending machine outside of the Neil Avenue Doors. It is available for use by anyone, church attendees or neighbors in the community who suspect someone is experiencing an opiod overdose. The machine also includes Fentynal test strips.

Narcan (generic name: naloxone) is a life-saving medication used to rapidly reverse an opioid overdose. It works by blocking opioid receptors in the brain to restore breathing in someone whose breath has slowed or stopped due to drugs like fentanyl, heroin, or prescription painkillers.

Emergency Administration Steps

If you suspect an overdose, act immediately. You do not need medical training to use Narcan. 

1. Check for response: Yell the person's name and shake their shoulders.

2. Give Narcan: Hold the device with your thumb on the plunger. Insert the tip into a nostril and press the plunger firmly.

3. Call 911: Always call for emergency help immediately after the first dose, as Narcan's effects are temporary (30–90 minutes) and the person could stop breathing again.

4. Wait and watch: If they don't wake up or breathe normally within 2–3 minutes, give a second dose in the other nostril using a new device.

5. Recovery position: If they are breathing, roll them onto their side to prevent choking if they vomit.

Knowing that many in our community are facing difficult times, King Avenue is excited to introduce our very own "Little Free Pantry."

Our goal is simple: to offer immediate, on-the-fly assistance to both our church family and neighbors in need. You can find the pantry on the lower level in the Children’s Hallway (outside the large children’s classroom). 

We invite everyone to be a part of this vital community service! When you notice items have run out, please help restock the pantry. This is a hands-on project for all families and kids of all ages. Kindly stock the pantry directly—do not drop off donations with Gwen.

Questions? Contact Gwen at gwen@kingave.org.

King Avenue has a team of individuals that shares a Saturday morning meals on wheels (MOW) route. Each Saturday, one or two members of our MOW team picks up food at LifeCare Alliance in south Columbus, and delivers 10-15 meals to home-bound and low-income individuals.  Our route is primarily just east of downtown, both north and south of Broad Street. We need additional team members to cover 5th Saturdays and to serve as subs for the team. This is a rewarding ministry with minimal time commitment, approximately 1.5 to 2 hours, from 10:30 a.m. to around noon.  

For more information or to volunteer your time with the MOW team, please contact Jill Geiger, jillgeig@gmail.com.