Bridgeport Rescue Mission, Inc.
Fighting poverty from the inside out
Programs and results
What we aim to solve
Bridgeport Rescue Mission provides essential services and life-changing recovery programs to economically and socially disenfranchised individuals so they can become self-sufficient, contributing members of our community. BRM is committed to meeting the physical, emotional, and spiritual needs of impoverished and homeless individuals who are experiencing a short- or long-term crisis. BRM's programs are designed to address the problems linked to poverty, homelessness, and substance abuse, which are often preceded by issues related to lack of education, dysfunctional family history, economic stress, domestic abuse, lack of employable job skills, and no life purpose. The Mission reaches out to ALL men, women, and children, regardless of race, ethnicity, creed or economic status, providing all services and programs free of charge.
Our programs
What are the organization's current programs, how do they measure success, and who do the programs serve?
Food Distribution, Emergency Housing & Life Recovery Services
ALL OF OUR SERVICES ARE PROVIDED COMPLETELY FREE OF CHARGE TO ANYONE WHO COMES TO OUR DOORS.
Bridgeport Rescue Mission (BRM) is a 501(c)(3) faith-based, nonprofit organization established in 1993 to respond to the needs of the working poor and homeless in Coastal Connecticut. The Mission started on the East side of Bridgeport feeding hungry neighbors out of a station wagon and today, BRM operates 2 campuses, two Mobile Kitchens and has expanded into the Community Care Center -- a newly renovated 65,000+ building that will nearly triple our services to the community.
Our mission is to embrace the urban poor with the compassion of Christ, giving them hope and healing for a changed life, helping them to find their way home.
Our vision is to excel in providing food, shelter, clothing, education, and job training, and residential discipleship for the urban poor and addicted.
We fight poverty from the inside out by providing a place of hope and dignity as we feed the hungry, clothe the needy, shelter the homeless, and restore the addicted.
Bridgeport Rescue Mission provides essential services and life-changing residential recovery programs to economically and socially disenfranchised individuals so they can become self-sufficient, contributing members of our community. BRM is committed to meeting the physical, emotional, and spiritual needs of impoverished and homeless individuals who are experiencing a short- or long-term crisis. BRM’s programs are designed to address the problems linked to poverty, homelessness, trauma, and substance abuse, which are often preceded by issues related to lack of education, dysfunctional family history, economic stress, domestic abuse, lack of employable jobs skills, and no life purpose.
The Mission reaches out to ALL men, women, and children, regardless of race, ethnicity, creed, or economic status, providing all services and programs free of charge.
S U M M A R Y O F P R O G R A M S
Food Outreach Program: Bridgeport Rescue Mission is the largest provider of food assistance in Coastal Connecticut (Bridgeport, Norwalk, New Haven) and provided more than 921,000 meals in 2020 to the working poor and homeless in our community. This includes:
• Breakfast, lunch, and dinner served out of the Mission’s Main Campus; more than 375 meals daily
• Our Mobile Kitchens and Mobile Pantries serve in impoverished neighborhoods in Bridgeport and South Norwalk. Volunteers serve with encouraging words and prayer to guests who are unable to come to our Main Campus.
• Pantry (free grocery store) open five days a week for impoverished and food-insecure families. Our Pantry offers fresh produce, dry goods, meat, and dairy items to enable community guests to feed their families.
• The Mission’s Great ThanksGiving Project provides over 5,000 families in Bridgeport, Norwalk, Stamford, and New Haven with a frozen turkey and bag of fixings, along with warm winterwear each year during this annual event.
• BRM also provides about 400 children participating in South Norwalk’s Summer Meals program, breakfast, and a homemade bagged lunch for 9 weeks each summer since 2009 and partners with Urban Impact’s youth mentorship program XLR8 to provide about 3,000 warm dinners to kids annually.
Emergency Housing for Men & Women - The Abundant Life Program
• Annually provide more than 37,960 nights of shelter along with a hot meal, clean clothes, and a warm bed to men, women, and children in three separate facilities.
Residential Women & Children's Program - The Renewed Life Program
Provides clean, safe room and board to homeless moms with young children. The highly skilled Renewed Life Program staff provide case management, counseling, and job and life skills to the moms, and case management for the children’s health and educational needs.
Residential Addiction Recovery for Men & Women - The New Life Program
• BRM has two separate campuses that offer a 6-12 month-long residential addiction recovery program. The New Life Program addresses the complex needs of men and women struggling with the life-dominating issues related to substance abuse. The curriculum includes counseling, case management, work therapy, and 15+ hours of classroom education weekly, with a focus on three key areas of life transformation: Spiritual Formation, Addiction Recovery, and Life-Skills Development.
Supportive Housing Program
The Supportive Housing Programs provide men and women who graduate from the New Life Program -- as well as from other Christian Programs -- with transitional housing, case management, and in-house apprenticeship positions to assist them in their transition to independent living.
Where we work
Affiliations & memberships
Christian Management Association (CMA) 2002
Association of Gospel Rescue Missions (AGRM) 2022
External reviews

Videos
Our results
How does this organization measure their results? It's a hard question but an important one.
Average number of service recipients per month
This metric is no longer tracked.Totals By Year
Population(s) Served
Homeless people, Adults, Children and youth, Non-adult children, Parents
Related Program
Food Distribution, Emergency Housing & Life Recovery Services
Type of Metric
Output - describing our activities and reach
Direction of Success
Increasing
Context Notes
• 12,500 provided regular services (not counting the over 8,000 additional individuals served in other towns through The Great THANKSgiving Project in November 2022)
Number of nights of safe housing provided to families of domestic violence
This metric is no longer tracked.Totals By Year
Related Program
Food Distribution, Emergency Housing & Life Recovery Services
Type of Metric
Output - describing our activities and reach
Direction of Success
Increasing
Context Notes
During the pandemic, our women with children program was discontinued, however, in 2023 we opened to our first mother to begin restoring this program. We plan to add up to 17 families in 2023
Number of partner churches
This metric is no longer tracked.Totals By Year
Related Program
Food Distribution, Emergency Housing & Life Recovery Services
Type of Metric
Input - describing resources we use
Direction of Success
Increasing
Context Notes
Churches that partner by providing volunteers and/or funding for the important mission of ending poverty from the inside out.
Number of clinic sites
This metric is no longer tracked.Totals By Year
Related Program
Food Distribution, Emergency Housing & Life Recovery Services
Type of Metric
Input - describing resources we use
Direction of Success
Holding steady
Context Notes
In partnership with the SAGE medical team, we provide space for a medical health clinic on-site. This clinic also provides mental health services.
Goals & Strategy
Learn about the organization's key goals, strategies, capabilities, and progress.
Charting impact
Four powerful questions that require reflection about what really matters - results.
What is the organization aiming to accomplish?
1. Broaden and deepen our Christian witness through the services we provide.
2. Build a Care Center to streamline and expand operations in our food and clothing services.
3. Continue to increase the number of men and women who graduate from our year-long New Life Discipleship Program for those dealing with life-dominating issues such as drug and alcohol addictions.
4. Continue to support our New Life graduates in our Supportive Housing Program.
What are the organization's key strategies for making this happen?
1. Launch a Capital Campaign to build new Care Center.
2. Strengthen programming in New Life Program to increase number of graduates.
What are the organization's capabilities for doing this?
Food Outreach Program - providing 600,000 meals each year.
Emergency Shelter for Men, Women and Mothers with Children
Great ThanksGiving Project - providing 4,000 families with a turkey, bag of fixings and a winter coat for any member of the family that needs one (approximately 15,000 coats distributed each year).
New Life Discipleship Program for Men & Women - graduating approximately 50 men and women each year.
What have they accomplished so far and what's next?
Bridgeport Rescue Mission has:
- Increased the capacity and productivity of our kitchen with a renovation and upgrade of refrigeration units.
- Deepened the reach of our Food Program by 1) increasing the number of children receiving meals through our Summer Lunch Program. 2) Adding a stop to our Mobile Kitchen routes.
- Added and renovated bedrooms in our Women and Children's Program to increase the number of homeless mothers with children that we serve.
- Added a Supportive Housing Program to our New Life addiction recovery program to strengthen the recovery of our graduates.
- Commenced work on our Care Center project.
How we listen
Seeking feedback from people served makes programs more responsive and effective. Here’s how this organization is listening.
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Who are the people you serve with your mission?
The local community, homeless individuals and families, and those in our residential programs.
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How is your organization using feedback from the people you serve?
To identify and remedy poor client service experiences, To identify bright spots and enhance positive service experiences, To make fundamental changes to our programs and/or operations, To inform the development of new programs/projects, To identify where we are less inclusive or equitable across demographic groups, To strengthen relationships with the people we serve, To understand people's needs and how we can help them achieve their goals
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What significant change resulted from feedback?
Recently, we opened a day center where individuals living homeless can come in to warm up, shower, and receive a warm cup of something and a meal. Input from those we serve helped us to provide this service this winter.
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Which of the following feedback practices does your organization routinely carry out?
We collect feedback from the people we serve at least annually, We take steps to get feedback from marginalized or under-represented people, We aim to collect feedback from as many people we serve as possible, We take steps to ensure people feel comfortable being honest with us, We look for patterns in feedback based on demographics (e.g., race, age, gender, etc.), We look for patterns in feedback based on people’s interactions with us (e.g., site, frequency of service, etc.), We engage the people who provide feedback in looking for ways we can improve in response, We act on the feedback we receive, We tell the people who gave us feedback how we acted on their feedback, We ask the people who gave us feedback how well they think we responded
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What challenges does the organization face when collecting feedback?
We don't have any major challenges to collecting feedback
Financials
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Operations
The people, governance practices, and partners that make the organization tick.
Connect with nonprofit leaders
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- Analyze a variety of pre-calculated financial metrics
- Access beautifully interactive analysis and comparison tools
- Compare nonprofit financials to similar organizations
Want to see how you can enhance your nonprofit research and unlock more insights? Learn More about GuideStar Pro.
Connect with nonprofit leaders
SubscribeBuild relationships with key people who manage and lead nonprofit organizations with GuideStar Pro. Try a low commitment monthly plan today.
- Analyze a variety of pre-calculated financial metrics
- Access beautifully interactive analysis and comparison tools
- Compare nonprofit financials to similar organizations
Want to see how you can enhance your nonprofit research and unlock more insights? Learn More about GuideStar Pro.
Bridgeport Rescue Mission, Inc.
Board of directorsas of 03/21/2023
Mr. Edward Morgan
Bowery Mission Founder and Inspirational Leadership LLC
Term: 2024 - 2021
Stacey Cardenas
JD, UNC School of Law
Mark Curtis
Splash
Kerry Stratton
Bridgeport Diocese School Corp
Al Carey
Unifi, Inc.
Robert Fiscus
Retired, UIL Holdings and United Illuminating
Michael Voytek
Voytek Law Firm
Shelley Johnson
MBA, Univ of Redlands
Ed Morgan
Inspirational Leadership, LLC
Lydee Conway-Hummel
Retired Realtor, Halstead Property/Country Living
Joy Topazian Moore
Partner, Curseaden & Moore, LLC
Paul Hiller
CFO, Town of Shelton
Board leadership practices
GuideStar worked with BoardSource, the national leader in nonprofit board leadership and governance, to create this section.
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Board orientation and education
Does the board conduct a formal orientation for new board members and require all board members to sign a written agreement regarding their roles, responsibilities, and expectations? Yes -
CEO oversight
Has the board conducted a formal, written assessment of the chief executive within the past year ? Yes -
Ethics and transparency
Have the board and senior staff reviewed the conflict-of-interest policy and completed and signed disclosure statements in the past year? Yes -
Board composition
Does the board ensure an inclusive board member recruitment process that results in diversity of thought and leadership? Yes -
Board performance
Has the board conducted a formal, written self-assessment of its performance within the past three years? Yes
Organizational demographics
Who works and leads organizations that serve our diverse communities? Candid partnered with CHANGE Philanthropy on this demographic section.
Leadership
The organization's leader identifies as:
Race & ethnicity
Gender identity
Sexual orientation
Disability
No data
Equity strategies
Last updated: 03/17/2023GuideStar partnered with Equity in the Center - an organization that works to shift mindsets, practices, and systems to increase racial equity - to create this section. Learn more
- We review compensation data across the organization (and by staff levels) to identify disparities by race.
- We ask team members to identify racial disparities in their programs and / or portfolios.
- We disaggregate data to adjust programming goals to keep pace with changing needs of the communities we support.
- We employ non-traditional ways of gathering feedback on programs and trainings, which may include interviews, roundtables, and external reviews with/by community stakeholders.
- We have long-term strategic plans and measurable goals for creating a culture such that one’s race identity has no influence on how they fare within the organization.
- We use a vetting process to identify vendors and partners that share our commitment to race equity.
- We have a promotion process that anticipates and mitigates implicit and explicit biases about people of color serving in leadership positions.
- We seek individuals from various race backgrounds for board and executive director/CEO positions within our organization.
- We have community representation at the board level, either on the board itself or through a community advisory board.
- We help senior leadership understand how to be inclusive leaders with learning approaches that emphasize reflection, iteration, and adaptability.
- We measure and then disaggregate job satisfaction and retention data by race, function, level, and/or team.
- We engage everyone, from the board to staff levels of the organization, in race equity work and ensure that individuals understand their roles in creating culture such that one’s race identity has no influence on how they fare within the organization.