MRD Youth Builder Program

The MRD Youth Builder Program was originally designed to provide inner city youth with free after school, weekend, and summertime recreational activities. Approximately 30% of these youth are stranded in emergency housing or homeless shelters, and 100% fall below the poverty level. In addition, the majority of them have no father figure in their home. The core of MRD's philosophy is to develop lifelong skills in the areas of self-esteem building, conflict management and meditation, violence prevention and personal safety. Over the years it evolved to include after school, weekend, and summertime personal development, educational, cultural and community service activities. The focus is on preparing youth for the transition to middle or high school, providing advanced placement programming, college career exploration, and after school tutoring. Ultimately, MRD strives to enable youth to make responsible decisions, and help them contribute to their own future. Since 1967, and continuing after Mr. Law retired from his teaching position in 1999, the MRD Youth Builder Program has served over 15,000 inner city youth.

MRD Samaritans Outreach Program

The MRD Samaritans Outreach Program helps provide for the basic needs of the homeless, vulnerable youth, and their families. Since 2006 because of the ongoing economic downturn, Mr. Law has increased his focus on serving the growing number of people in urgent need. MRD provides emergency food, clothing, school supplies, and basic necessities for both individuals and families. In addition, Mr. Law frequently provides referrals to agencies that provide housing, furnishings, counseling, job placement, financial aid and healthcare. On a daily basis, he regularly provides:

• Emergency Food: Water, Sandwiches, Fruit, Bakery Goods, Baby Formula
• Clothing: Coats, Hats, Boots, Socks, and Gloves
• School Clothing, Books, Backpacks, and School supplies
• Funding for School Fieldtrips, Stuffed Animals
• Funds for Bus Fare, Bus passes, and Minnesota ID Cards
• Basic Needs: Blankets, Diapers, First aid supplies, Personal Care Products
• Funds for Prescription Medication Co Payments
• Funds for Emergency Rent Payments

MRD 363 Days Food Program

MRD 363 Days Food Program Due to the rapid growth in the number of people living below the poverty level, in 1999 Mr. Law began feeding the homeless and families in need on a daily basis. He would distribute food every night from 9pm to Noon the following day. Making up to 20 stops a night he provided food for about 500 people – including families, individuals, homeless in shelters, as well as some living totally outdoors. He purchased unsold bakery goods, and sandwiches at a discount from several stores and gas stations every night. In addition he bought milk and other items at local grocery stores as needed. People have asked him what he’s going to do on Thanksgiving and Christmas, since many organizations offer meals to the homeless on those days. His response has always been, “I’ll let those organizations handle those two days, and I’ll take care of the other 363 days of the year”.

Unfortunately, by the end of 2006 stores and gas stations began to reduce inventories, and his supply of available food began to diminish. And then in early 2007 Mr. Law ran into one of his former students, Tony Zosel, who asked him if he was still involved in helping the poor. They talked for a long time and within a week Tony called back with the news that his bible study group would like to help him, and the rest is history. Their initial goal was to get 150 sandwiches made, and donated as many times a year as possible. They started with a few volunteers and a call to action for community groups, churches, schools, and teams to make and donate the sandwiches. To help coordinate the growing sandwich donations, a dedicated website was developed and linked to the MRD site, named appropriately: www.363days.org.

In 2007 the MRD 363 Days Food Program provided 45,000 sandwiches, which increased to well over 520,000 by 2010! In 2011 Mr. Law is on pace to distribute over 800,000 sandwiches! All of this has been done through the passionate giving of both the time and resources of our community, and the part-time help of a handful of dedicated volunteers led by Tony Zosel. Currently, there are an estimated 6,500 homeless people in the Twin Cities Metropolitan area, and 2,200 of them are children. The goal of 363 Days is to feed as many of them every day as possible. At present, Mr. Law delivers an average of 2200 sandwiches a day to the following shelters and locations:

• Salvation Army/Harbor Light Safe Bay Minneapolis
• Catholic Charities Minneapolis
• Marie Sandvik Center Minneapolis
• Village Minneapolis
• Waite House Minneapolis
• River of Life Church Minneapolis
• Loaves & Fishes Minneapolis
• The Prayer Center Minneapolis
• Urban League Minneapolis
• Little Earth Minneapolis
• Dorothy Day (Catholic Charities) St. Paul
• Union Gospel Mission St. Paul
• Individuals/Families Minneapolis/St. Paul
• Emergency Disaster Relief Minnesota

Delivering sandwiches to homeless shelters every night is only a portion of the assistance 363 Days provides. In addition, Mr. Law distributes sandwiches and bottled water to individuals and families living on the street, or totally outdoors. 363 Days also provides assistance with emergency disaster relief. For example, in the one week period following the North Minneapolis tornado in May 2011, Mr. Law distributed over 20,000 sandwiches and bottled water to numerous relief locations, individuals, and families in need.