PrayGround Cafe brightens Ybor City

FBC photo by Ken Touchton

Joel Vicente, is pastor of Open Arms Ministry in Ybor City, a church which ministers through the PrayGround Cafe where people can have access to the internet to be able to pursue jobs online.

YBOR CITY (FBC)—Welcome to the PrayGround Cafe that’s serving up “bolder coffee, bolder prayer” and bucket loads of compassion.

Located at the Open Arms Ministry in Ybor City, the coffee shop is an integral way the church has embraced its community, nestled just eat of Tampa’s downtown.

“Our vision is to have the cafe open all day with computers where the people living here can receive training and can find job resources on-line,” explained Pastor Joel Vicente, who planted the church ten years ago. “In the inner city, people lack internet access.”

FBC photo by Ken Touchton

The congregation hopes to house a counseling room and perhaps a preschool as it continues to reach out to its urban neighborhood. Citing compassion as one of its core values, each quarter, the church hosts a yard sale offering clothes, small furnishings, food for the homeless and hygiene kits.

It’s all part of the strategy the church implements to touch this predominantly African-American and Hispanic community that lives in the shadows of the historic cigar factories of Ybor City. Founded 100 years ago by Vicente Martinez Ybor, the neighborhood was populated by wealthy Cuban families working in the cigar factories and it thrived as a manufacturing core, entertainment center and melting pot for wealthy Hispanics and Italians.

When the factories were shut down in the early 1900’s, hard times followed, and the community—just two miles east of downtown Tampa—became a deserted land filled with low-income housing projects.

Yet the character of the wrought iron covered buildings and brick streets was never lost. In the mid 1990s night clubs and bars flourished in Ybor City, bringing 40,000 party revelers and increased crime to the area each week­­end. A decision by the City of Tampa to clean up the area and bring more family entertainment has resulted in a revitalization. Trendy, high-priced lofts have filled the former factory buildings with wealthy urban dwellers. Additionally, expensive shops and restaurants and night life provided economic stimulus. Now the area is divided into the “haves”—and “have nots.”

“The poor is our primary focus group,” said Vicente. “We go into their homes and there is no air conditioning, no running water and no food.”

“These children are not promised the next meal, especially in the sum­mer when school is out and the free breakfast and lunch programs are unavailable,” he said.

“These are the people we have been ministering to.”

FBC photo by Ken Touchton

Music is an important part of worship at the PlayGround Cafe in Ybor City.

As an outreach into the community, Vicente serves on the school advisory council of the nearby Booker T. Washington Elementary School, where nearly 98 percent of the students are on the government-funded free or reduced lunch programs.

It was through the advisory council that he met Rosa and her two adopted daughters Brianna, 10, and Alicia, 6, who live in one of Ybor City’s government-subsidized housing project. “My faith has been restored through this ministry,” she said, asking that her last name not be used. “We had no furniture, no food, and little to put on the table when the church helped us.”

The rededicated Christian sings in the church choir every week and her oldest daughter was baptized in April. “I have hope now and my days of partying, my days of fighting and my days of being crazy are over.”

When the church was started ten years ago, the fledgling congregation sponsored a feeding program, providing 400 meals on Sunday from a Seventh Day Adventist church building and handing out bags of groceries to families in the community. The congregation grew to 100, many of them children and teens from the housing projects.

The congregation never grew beyond that point, and after the Adventist church was sold, they moved temporarily to a local restaurant. At first many members were lost with the move, but from that location God blessed the “discouraged” congregation of 30, said Vincente, as the church grew to 90 adults and children and baptized 20 people in a year.

In 2006, the congregation purchased a 400,000 square foot building on the corner of Republic of Cuba Avenue and 18th Avenue which had served as a daycare. While most Ybor City properties are being sold for up to one million dollars, the property owned by a Methodist church was offered to the congregation for $219,000. Armed with a loan from the Florida Baptist Financial Services and a grant from the Tampa Bay Baptist Association, the congregation purchased the building and began renovations, converting it into a church.

“It was a huge blessing,” said Vicente of the new facility. The congregation has spent the past year laying beautiful intricate tile in the foyer, painting the walls, placing stain glass windows and creating an attractive worship environment. Now the church stands as an oasis in the teeming inner city.

After a year of preparing God’s sanctuary for worship, Vicente said the church is ready to concentrate on its community. An emphasis on leadership training has been implemented. In April, the congregation launched a new Spanish-speaking church within its facilities. Average attendance at the combined churches now numbers 110.

“God made it clear to us to get His house ready during these past two years,” said Vicente. “Now our focus is back to the community.”