24-Hour Crisis Phone and Text Line: 1-855-325-4296
Crisis Chat: iowacrisischat.org
Food bank: 319-351-0128
It’s 1969 on the University of Iowa campus. Two young freshmen return to their Burge Hall dorm room and find the completely unexpected – their roommate has barricaded the door and attempted suicide. They rush her to care and after a long and scary night, are sent home knowing she is going to be physically okay. But in the following days, as the two women deal with both their roommate’s and their own emotional upheaval, they learn there are simply no resources available to help them.
That experience launched a campaign of advocacy, for those two young women and on behalf of all University of Iowa students, to establish support services for others in crisis. The two women began knocking on doors and by 1970, had found an ally in Verne Kelley, the Community Mental Health Center’s director at that time. With Mr. Kelley’s help, these students established what would become The Crisis Center of Johnson County.
The Crisis Center was founded with the philosophy that a client should determine how he or she can best be helped, using a process that ensures dignity to all who are served. This philosophy has facilitated The Crisis Center’s growth as the community it serves has grown in the past 40 years.
A small food pantry was added in 1978 in response to client needs. Clothing and household items became available through vouchers from Goodwill and Crowded Closet in 1983.
Throughout the 1980’s, The Crisis Center worked to expand its suicide prevention services and began offering support for survivors of a suicide loss. Services were developed to respond to the needs of transients and the homeless.
In the following decade, a collaboration with the local religious community led to distribution of emergency financial support. The Food Bank grew into a weekly operation and began working with Table-to-Table to distribute locally gleaned food.
In recent years, The Crisis Center has added suicide prevention training and crisis incident stress management services.
CommUnity Crisis Services and Food Bank, formerly The Crisis Center, is a volunteer-driven organization that provides immediate and non-judgmental support for individuals facing emotional, food, or financial crisis.
