Paying it forward can be beautiful in a multitude of ways.
The Moore Faith Medical Clinic was formed in 2015 by a group of volunteers after tornadoes devastated the area in 2013. The small clinic is open part-time, offering free primary care, urgent care, diagnostic testing, disease management, and other medical care. Now in its seventh year, the clinic is still run entirely by volunteers and serves thousands of patients each year.
“After the tornado, a bunch of us from different churches just worked together to try to help rebuild the community, and we found that there was a lot of continued need,” Dave Evans, executive director of Moore Faith Medical Clinic, said. “Our primary focus is serving patients, so this is huge; I don’t know if you looked at the building on the way in, but we’re desperately in need of a little beauty.”
The clinic, with its empty flowerbeds, long-dead shrubbery, and patchy lawn, has needed a green thumb’s touch for quite some time.
“This place has been neglected for years. Originally, it was the Cleveland County Health Department. Then it was vacant. Then it served Moore as the police station after the tornadoes. It was just temporarily while they were building the new one, but nothing’s been done. Since we took the space, we haven’t had the resources or the manpower to do anything with the lawn and landscaping. We’ve just been trying to take care of people’s health and medicines. So this is going to make a huge difference. I feel like this is going to brighten the whole area. Yeah, she’s gonna be beautiful.”
Mark and Shelly Braisher decided to step in to help beautify the space. The Braishers own ManageMowed, a landscaping company, and wanted to use their business to pay it forward in the community.
“We wanted to do something good with our business and give back in some way,” Shelly Braisher said. “Mark reached out to our pastor, who told us about the medical clinic. We came over and met Dave and started getting the ball rolling. It’s a worthwhile place. It does a lot for the community and the people here. I know it’s not top of the mind because the people here are doing things that are much more important than grass and landscaping, but we feel like this is one way that we can contribute and make it nice for the volunteers and people who are coming in. It’s just something we’re able to do that can lift things off their plate.”
The clinic’s volunteers are looking forward to the revitalization of their space, and the Braishers think it’s something the patients will appreciate as well.
“When people come here to the free clinic, but there’s no reason why they shouldn’t come to a place they can be proud to walk into, the same as any other doctor’s office,” Mark Braisher said. “Usually the medical field takes very good care of their landscaping and such, and when you walk in it’s a nice building, nice image. We’d like for them to have that image for them as well. When there’s limited resources, that’s difficult. For us to be able to do that takes that piece away for them, it’s less they have to worry about, and it helps make it a place the patients and the volunteers can be proud of.”
Once the spring gardening season begins, the Braishers will completely redo the beds with flowers and shrubbery and keep up with needed lawn care throughout the year.
“It’s another way that we see our community, loving each other and taking care of each other,” Evans said. “It’s a great way to show that they care about the patients and the people who come here. We’re all volunteers. Everybody. Every doctor, every nurse or social worker, chaplain, we’re all volunteers. So it’s just another way that we see this community coming together and to love our neighbors. It’s really amazing. Volunteers are so critical. Mark and Shelly are just another example of people who care. so it’s beautiful when you see a plan come together.”
To learn more about the Moore Faith Medical Clinic, visit www.moorefaithclinic.org. To learn more about ManageMowed, visit www.managemowed.com.
