The vision of the Samaritan Community Center is to serve the poor, hurting and homeless of Northwest Arkansas. Our desire is to help these individuals break the cycle of hopelessness through changes in their lives and restoring their families to be healthy and productive within the community.

Description:
The Samaritan Community Center has been serving the poor, hurting and homeless of Northwest Arkansas for more than 18 years. We are ideologically different than other social service agencies in that we believe that true life change for many of those clients we serve cannot come through a single point of contact where a “hand-out” is given. We believe that most positive change will only come through helping clients identify individual growth areas and to make conscious choices to achieve personal success in those areas. That type of accountability-based interaction only comes through our more than 300 volunteers developing open, communicative relationships with our clients and requires ongoing opportunities to interact with each other.

Our program services focus on addressing the needs of the whole person (physical, emotional, financial, and spiritual), as we believe that they are interconnected within the person. We offer a wide array of services ranging from a soup kitchen that prepares and serves/delivers more than 25,000 meals each year to children’s programs that provide nutritional assistance to more than 1,500 school children throughout Benton and Washington Counties each week to more than $65,000 in emergency employment opportunities through our Springdale thrift store.

At the Samaritan Community Center, we try to show the love and compassion of Christ to everyone who enters our doors. It is central to everything we do, whether that expression of love comes in the form of a listening ear, a bag filled with groceries, or helping a young family develop a household budget. Although many within our community choose to deny that poverty really and truly exists in Northwest Arkansas, we choose to recognize the issue and care for those within its grip.

History:
The Samaritan Community Center was originally founded in 1989 as an outreach food ministry to the poor by Fellowship Bible Church of Lowell. In 2002, the ministry became an independent, non-profit organization and has expanded its mission focus to the poor to include a food pantry, a soup kitchen, social services, children's programs, and emergency dental clinic. In 2003, a thrift store was opened in Springdale which provides clothing and household items to families referred by SCC social workers. A second office location in Springdale also opened in 2004 to better serve clients from Washington County.

Contact people:

Debbie Rambo, Executive Director, (phone), (email) Gary Evans, Operations Manager, (phone), (email) Jane Rowland, Program Coordinator, (phone), (email)

Office fax number: (479) 636-5254

Address:

1211 West Hudson Road Rogers, AR 72756 (See a map)

Web Site: http://www.samcc.org

Directions:

From Hwy 540 north, take exit 86. Turn east on SE 14th Street (also known as Hudson Road in Rogers). Travel approximately 2.5 miles, and our office will be located on the left (north) side of the road just past. . . (more)