Good News Partners 2011 Annual Report

Good News Partners 2011 Annual Report
On this, our 35th
Anniversary,
we extend our
gratitude to
Bud Ogle and
wife, Donna,
for founding,
nurturing, and
loving the Good
News Partners
community. We
are blessed as
Bud continues to
be an important
part of GNP
as President
Emeritus,
furthering his, and
our, call to end
homelessness and
hopelessness, to
foster justice, and
to build bridges of
reconciliation.
Chairman of the Board
Good News Partners continues
to grow and change. Change is
not only good but a requirement
in a healthy organization.
Change is positive when an
organization continually adapts
to the operational realities it
faces, but negative if it alters the
organization’s original vision and
goals. I think Good News Partners is solidly in the “good
change” category.
GNP is still firmly focused in our commitment to
follow the will of God as we respond to homelessness
and hopelessness. In the last year, through the generous
support of the developing Church Collaborative, we
purchased an additional building in the neighborhood
that will expand living options. We also renovated
previously owned space to both consolidate staffing in
one improved location and to free up additional space for
housing in the Jonquil Hotel.
Additional changes continue on our operational
side. We have bid adieu to former board members Jan
Niemeyer and Andy Shaw. The countless hours of work
and prayer they have given to GNP deserve more than
simple words of thanks. We all need to thank God for
their devotion to the shaping of this ministry. We are
also changing leadership of the board. I am stepping
down as chair and those duties will be turned over to the
capable hands of current board member David Holly.
We are infusing the board with new blood and spirit
by adding four new members. The board continues
to be enthusiastic concerning the management and
vision supplied by Ronn Frantz, Executive Director.
His calm leadership has provided the board with
confidence as GNP moves toward ending homelessness
and hopelessness, beginning in our neighborhood and
expanding to the whole of God’s creation.
Gary Brugh
Chairman of the Board
2 Thirty-Fifth Anniversary Issue
Executive Director
As we enter the 35th year of
partnering in the Good News,
I am reminded of the exhortation
of the writer to the Hebrews,
“Therefore, since we are
surrounded by so great a cloud
of witnesses, let us also lay aside
every weight and the sin that clings
so closely, and let us run with
perseverance the race that is set before us…”
Good News Partners is greatly enriched by all
of our partners, past, present, and future, especially
other organizational partners in the North of Howard
area with whom we have been working shoulder to
shoulder for much of our 35 years. We have enjoyed
the opportunity to sit together with the leaders of these
groups and reflect upon what we have and have not
seen accomplished in the past two generations. We are
remembering in order to push forward.
As I reflect upon the close of our last year, I am
also reminded of another anniversary that presses greatly
upon us: the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 tragedies.
Certainly, that anniversary is much larger and more
dramatic than that of a small community living and
working in the very northeast corner of the large City
of Chicago. Yet, I am reminded of Dr. Martin Luther
King’s remarks that “the arc of history is long but it
bends towards justice.” It is often the small things, the
consistent things, the everyday things that have the largest
impact and lasting value: feeding the hungry, clothing the
naked, visiting the sick and imprisoned, educating the
young, housing the homeless.
I hope that as you review the work of Good News
Partners over the past year, you will recognize where
and how you have been contributing to the bend of
history towards justice. I hope also that you will see the
road ahead for yourself as a partner in the Good News,
building bridges of reconciliation. The choices we make,
be they small or ordinary, are momentous. Shalom!
Ronn Frantz
Executive Director