Friday, Oct. 1, 2010

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‘To bring a smile to your face by sharing good news.’

“If you don’t dream dreams, your dreams will never come true.”

—Unknown

‘Big House’ offers message,second chanceBy COLLEEN HOLT

“Sometimes the most im-portant step in rehabilitation is knowing that someone be-lieves in you, and believes you are worth a second chance” — so say the folks at the Big House Burger Joint in Conway.

This combination restaurant and Christ-centered ministry for parolees was the brainchild of Mike and Paula Willbanks, their son Shane Willbanks and Ray and Teresa Kendall as part of Second Chance Ministries.

The path to the Big House Burger Joint started eight years ago.

“Eight years ago, I became a felon,” Shane Willbanks said recently. “It changed my life

and it changed my parents’ lives.” Shane said he never went to jail for his actions, but was placed on probation.

“I became immersed in hav-ing to deal with the world of being a felon,” he said. “I had difficulty finding work. Every time I saw my parole officer, I was seeing other people being miserable having to deal with this stigma.”

Shane said God spoke to him loud and clear. “I found God again early on in this process, and I found my place of joy. I didn’t need to listen to what other people said I am because of what I did.” He decided then that he would help others find their own place of joy.

Shane’s parents saw things

in the process that needed to be changed, and they got involved for reform reasons. Thus started this family’s work at helping felons learn two things: God would forgive them, and they didn’t have to live with this stigma.

“It took me two years to not be angry at the system,” Mike said. “ I was arguing with God

— my life before that was as an elder in church, and I real-ized that living in an intimate relationship with God was the key.”

Mike said he asked God what He wanted him to do. The answer, Mike said, was: “I’ll tell you as soon as you get up and find me.”

When Mike began looking

for answers, he found Prison Fellowship Ministries. One thing Mike noticed is that there is very little after care for probationers and parolees. “I was concerned with after care, so I volunteered as the state point of contact to develop an after-care policy,” Mike said.

The Big House Burger Joint is open in south Conway as part of Second Chance Ministries.

see BIG HOUse n paGe 3

festival of chairs: CASA prepares to kick off ninth annual event, page 4.

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FRIDAY, OCT. 1, 2010

The original members of the Helton-Osburn-Spencer Ath-letic Scholarship fund started tailgating over thirty (30) years ago.

Three years ago the Schol-arship Fund was created for the benefit of all athletes attend-ing the University of Central Arkansas. To date we have raised over $25,000.00, which was endowed in 2009.

Each game we feed any-where from 400 to 600 people with our tailgate crew. We have gone cross-country tailgating in our efforts to support the Bears!

We started off with a 10’ x 10’ tent and now have a 40’ x 50’ tent with which to serve the fans. We feed the UCA Band, UCA Cheerleader and a host of Bears Fans.

The Helton-Osburn-Spencer Crew consists of Bill Helton, Harold Helton, Mark Osburn and Verlon Spencer. This group effort would not be possible without the help of such peo-ple such as Jim Lawson, Tom Lane, David Mitchell, George Bratton, James Stanley and Bobbi Helton helping to set up, tear down and serve the fans.

We have had several corpo-rate sponsors such as Y-107, Log Cabin Democrat, Pepsi-Cola, Petit Jean Meats, Tyson Foods, Chick-Fil-A, Ideal Bread, Lance Industries (chips), Virco Manufacturing and our local area Sonic Drive-In.

Be sure and not miss our homecoming spread served on the finest silver, compliments of Shelley Young — nothing but the best for the Bears!

Scholarship fund benefits

students

By COLLEEN HOLT

When natural disasters bring rapid changes to the lives of families in Central Arkansas, the American Red Cross is there to help. Today, changes are com-ing to the local Red Cross unit.

Wayne Denson, the new executive director of the North Central Arkansas Service Cen-ter, and Brigette Williams, direc-tor of community affairs, gave a recent update on the numerous and important services offered by the Red Cross, along with some of the new things hap-pening with this long-standing service agency.

Denson has served as execu-tive director of the North Cen-tral Arkansas chapter of the Red Cross (which includes White, Woodruff and Independence counties) for seven years, and recently added the responsibil-ity of overseeing the service center, which adds Conway, Cleburne, Perry, Van Buren and Faulkner counties to his respon-sibilities.

“This move more closely aligns us with the other chapters in Arkansas,” Denson said. “The service to our clients remains the same in spite of this change.”

One of Denson’s first respon-

sibilities happens to be finding a new building for the service center. “The building we are in — the United Services Center — has been sold and the new owners will be using the entire facility. We are in the process of finding a new place,” Denson said.

“We’re looking for a fabulous-ly visible place in which to live,” Williams added. “There are no structural changes happening. This region is covered.”

A very visible way the Red Cross assists families is when natural disasters, such as tor-nadoes and hurricanes, strike. “We’ve had our share of tor-

nadoes in the past few years,” Williams said. “We actually had the service center set up here after the 2008 tornadoes. We were heavily hit for about three months … we spent quite a lot of time in this area. At the height of those storms, we had as many as 400 Red Cross workers, people from across the country, responding. In addition, we were still respond-ing to other local issues, such as house fires and military assis-tance — the day-to-day things that happen.”

The Red Cross responded to

Local Red Cross preparing for change

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Leadership Council: (Front, seated) Wayne Denson, Bridgette Williams; (standing) Sancy Faulk, Steve Presley, DeEnna Norwine, Jody Gatchell, Richard Tyler.

“We are a group of believers who thought God should be involved in after care — the state just can’t do it alone.”

In his work, Mike helped de-velop a procedure for re-entry, restoration and rehabilitation. He said most convicted felons find four obstacles in life: they are banned from Food Stamps, from public housing assistance, training and education, and from Welfare; and employers can immediately screen them out because they have marked the “convicted felon” box on employment applications.

“I went to the elders at Fel-lowship Bible Church, and they gave us a room and support for our work,” he said. “I was able to go to the congregation and tell them what we were doing and that we needed men and women to be trained as men-tors and trainers.”

Shane, Mike and eight other parolees began the new program — “now we have 12 mentors and we are seeing 28 parolees,” Shane said. “We have seen more than 100 so far.”

A main problem the group encountered was the lack of employment opportunities for felons. The Willbankses and the Kendalls had dinner one evening, and the Kendalls “of-fered an opportunity for us to put our resources together in developing one or more busi-nesses in which we would plug the people we were training,” Mike said. “We had people who were very skilled, very versed in business.”

Shane said having a restau-rant had always been a pipe

dream of his. “My dad and I already had a sauce company for six or seven years prior to that, so we made a new label and started selling it online.”

About three years ago, a restaurant spot opened at the Lewis Livestock Auction sale barn building on Amity Road in south Conway. “This was a great way to get started, to get our name out there and work the kinks out,” Shane said. “All it needed was a little paint.”

Now, 12 felons are employed at the Big House Burger Joint, which serves breakfast, lunch and dinner at reasonable prices. The restaurant is open from 6 a.m. to 9 p.m. Tuesday through Friday. It is open from 6 a.m. to 4 p.m. Mondays, clos-ing early for weekly mentoring and accountability sessions.

“The owners, the mentors and all the protégés we’re working with meet and find out what’s going on,” Mike said. “One condition of the em-ployment here is to participate in the mentoring system. They each have a one-on-one men-tor that helps us get to know them well enough so we can

employ them.”The Willbankses also employ

several parolees at a landscap-ing business — Capstone Landscape Borders — special-izing in decorative concrete borders. When these business-es make a profit, the proceeds are put back into the Second Chance Enterprises.

“The reason we need a profit is to help build the employees’ resume and career opportuni-ties and to keep the enter-prises going. This way, we can replicate the opportunities and gather more people who need help.”

Mike said people have asked him if the group is taking advantage of people who are down on their luck. His answer is an adamant “no.”

“We have a strong commit-ment to these employees. In fact, we pay them at least $2.50 per hour more than minimum wage. You can’t live on mini-mum wage. They work hard.”

For Capstone, a crew of five — four men and a woman — recently went to a job site where they worked for 12 hours moving 4,000 pounds of

sand to be turned into 300 feet of decorated concrete borders. This crew, he said, was making more than $10 per hour. “They did quality work, it’s gorgeous,” Mike added. “This is a prime example of taking people who made a mistake and are under supervision, who want to make a change in their life.”

Shane said the Big House Burger Joint is “not a money-making thing. This is like a counseling job and cooking burgers on the side. They are learning to pray and to trust God.”

Like most of the other felons he comes into contact with, Shane said he could have easily gone back to his past life. “But we have chosen not to. That’s what this is about, watching them change.”

This need for change is reiterated in a flyer displayed at the restaurant, which is cleverly decorated with prison-related posters and the slogan, “Quality With Conviction.”

“Our mission is two-fold — to give those with law violations, who have been restored both in God and in lifestyle a second chance, and to put some dang good food on your table. We have succeeded in the former, and hope you agree that we have accomplished the latter!” the flyer says.

Offerings at the restaurant, according to the Commissary Sheet, include the Jail Bird chicken sandwich, Folsom Fries, the Yard Bird smoked chicken plate and the K-9 hot dog. The Willbankses barbecue sauce is front and center in many of the offerings.

One recent morning, a young lady was waiting tables while a young man was cooking eggs, bacon, sausage and ham in the kitchen. Shane said the cook, David, had been a cook at other Conway restaurants and was hired because he “could make the perfect egg.”

The ministry was recently featured on K-Love radio, and a gift shop is also included at the restaurant.

Shane said he normally has more applications than jobs available, and Second Chance Enterprises is now receiving re-ferrals from Faulkner County’s Drug Court and the Faulkner County Department of Com-munity Correction.

In the mentoring pro-gram, the Bible story of Paul in Philippians 3 is front and center — “Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heaven-ward in Christ Jesus.”

After his conversion to Christianity, Paul realizes that his past doesn’t define who he is. “He is looking forward and not going to camp on what he was and say ‘Whoa, what I did was bad’,” Mike said. “That is what society helps them do. Our program, this is part of the Good News.”

For more information, visit the Big House Burger Joint web site at www.bighouse-burgerjoint.com or call 501-548-0225. You may also find the group on Facebook and follow them on Twitter.

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BIG HOUSE from paGE 1

Do you have good news?Have you seen someone doing good?

Or just want to share some good news?

email:

conwaygoodnews@gmail.com and we will share your news

in the upcoming paper

www.arkansasgoodnews.com

By COLLEEN HOLT

The 9th annual Festival of Chairs, hosted by the Friends of CASA, will not only be a fun evening, it will be a wonderful symbol of how neglected chairs — just like neglected children — can be revitalized with a little tender loving care.

The festival, which will be held from 6:30 to 11 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 2, at the Centen-nial Valley Event Center, is a benefit for the Children’s Advocacy Alliance, a partnership of Court Appointed Special Advocates of the 20th Judicial District and the Central Arkan-sas Children’s Advocacy Center.

Tickets are $40 in advance and $50 at the door; dress is cocktail attire. For tickets or to reserve a table on a first-come, first-served basis, please call the CASA office at 501-328-3347, or visit the web site at www.casa20th.org.

At the Festival of Chairs, one-of-a-kind works of art will be sold in silent and live auctions to raise funds for the advocacy center, in particular support for training more volunteers. The evening will also include heavy hors d’oeuvres provided by restaurants and area chefs, and music by the Rodney Block Band.

Tess Fletcher, executive director, said they have already received 23 chairs for the auction, with more to be added soon. The themes used to decorate the chairs are wide ranging and envisioned by the artist.

Two special items that have been donated this year are a coffee table and a wet bar for outside use.

“We have some child-sized chairs and a couple of rockers,” she said. “We have a real good variety.”

She added that the Festival of Chairs is a good event for people of all ages. “My daughter likes to attend because she is big into arts and she likes to see all the differ-ent kinds of chairs. Plus, she likes to bid,” Fletcher said.

There will also be non-furniture items included in the auctions, such as a duck hunt, artwork, dental services, and house-ware items. A featured item is “an exquisite bauble donated by Fletcher Smith Jewelers.” Raffle tickets for the “Bubbly and Baubles” item can be purchased at the festival for $25 each or three tickets for $60.

This is the first Festival of Chairs since the merger of CASA of the 20th Judicial District and the Central Arkansas Children’s Ad-vocacy Center in April. CASA is a 501(c)(3) non-profit that serves abused and neglected children in Faulkner, Van Buren and Searcy counties.

The group’s mission is “to provide a voice in court for and on behalf of abused and ne-glected children who might otherwise have no voice for placement in a safe, permanent home.” CASA trains volunteers who work as “officers of the court” on behalf of the children.

Festival of Chairs kicks off ninth annual event

FRIDAY, OCT. 1, 2010

74 residence fires in the five-county area over the past year. “We were able to offer help to 85 families,” Denson said. This assistance included temporary stays in a motel, clothing and food. There were also three fire deaths and three flood victims, and the Red Cross was able to help with funeral expenses.

A unique area of help offered by the Red Cross is getting messages to members of the military. Williams said many times these messages relate unfortunate or sad news, but others relate news of new ba-bies. “We helped 68 families get messages to their loved ones that were deployed,” Denson

said. “The military won’t issue emergency leave unless the Red Cross verifies the need.”

The Red Cross also holds regular briefings with families who have loved ones deployed. “We encourage families to get to know us before they need us. The family will gather all the information to help us find their military members before we need to find them.” Williams added: “We can connect with a soldier in Iraq in less than two hours.”

For those here at home, the Red Cross offers classes that could save lives. About 1,400 people in the service center have taken first aid, cardiopul-monary resuscitation, auto-mated external defibrillator

(AED), babysitting and lifeguard classes.

“We need a lot more folks to be trained … we need at least one person in each family to be trained,” Williams said. When disasters happen, such as torna-does or ice storms, professional help is sometimes hindered in responding to medical emer-gencies due to blocked road-ways. “If we have lay people who know what to do they can stabilize the situation until a professional can arrive.”

The Red Cross encourages all places of business to have employees who are CPR trained and to consider getting AEDs.

Being prepared is a huge message for the Red Cross. “We must be prepared every month

for disasters,” Williams said. “We have one national-level disaster each year, and we’re stunned by the number of people who say ‘I didn’t know we were going to have bad weather’.” Williams said the purchase of a NOAA weather radio is vital, as is a family emergency kit.

In today’s environment of 24-hours news and accessibility, it’s easy to be prepared, Wil-liams said. “Individuals have to be personally accountable for yourself in what could be dan-gerous situations. Take personal assessment of what you need to do.”

Accessibility to all the Red Cross services is easy, too. The group is working on a new regional web site — informa-

tion can currently be found at www.redcrosslittlerock.org. You can also become a Facebook friend at American Red Cross of Greater Arkansas and follow the Red Cross on Twitter at arkredcross. For more info, call 1-800-Red-Cross.

Donations to help the Red Cross fulfill its mission are al-ways needed. After the disaster in Haiti, a text line was estab-lished to make donations. By texting REDCROSS 90999, you can donate $10 to the organiza-tion.

“On average, it costs $1,500 to respond to a house fire,” Williams said. “As an area, we respond to a house fire almost every day, so donations are vital.”

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