‘Not once did I feel down’: Kansas track coach gives ultimate lesson on perseverance
19 March 2024
WICHITA, Kan. (KSNW) — Ten years ago, Jennifer Garrison co-founded Passageways, an organization that helps homeless veterans.
“The news media covered the story of a veteran they had found dead underneath a bridge in Wichita, and it really — it hit home,” Garrison said. “We have veterans in our family who served, and we thought, hey, they came back resilient. Everybody else must be resilient. Well, we didn’t realize at the time they probably weren’t as resilient as we were giving them credit for.”
She and her mother started talking to agencies to find out where homeless veterans could go to get their lives back on track, and that place didn’t yet exist.
“So we started doing some hardcore praying and talking with lots of people that we knew to find out any suggestions, any ideas we wanted to hear at all, and that’s when we decided we needed to quit our careers and create Passageways from scratch,” Garrison said.
Garrison says quitting her job was scary, but she believed something greater was at work.
“You have that internal battle,” Garrison said. “We have kids, you know, like, ‘how are we going to do this? How are we going to keep food on our own table? How are we going to keep our lights on? How do we keep from becoming homeless?’ We finally started asking ourselves, ‘OK, are we really in charge now?’ So whatever, wherever God’s leading us, we’re going to follow and trust him. And that’s not to say there weren’t those scary moments and you really test your faith, but it was definitely like Velma and Louise going into this. We kind of figured it out as we went along.”
Everything started to fall into place for Passageways.
Garrison has dealt with homelessness in the past.
Garrison and her mom, Susan Moellinger, help veterans achieve whatever goal they may have, whether that be getting a job or going home to a family in a different state. Passageways helps veterans get into their own furnished homes for free.
Thomas Walker is a Passageways graduate, and one of many veterans Jennifer Garrison has helped.
“Passageways, in my opinion, saved my life,” Walker said.
Jennifer’s mission is to make sure veterans are relieved of hopelessness. She is constant in the lives she touches.
“I could always pick up the phone and call Jennifer or Susan, and if there was any way they could do it, it would be taken care of,” Walker said.
Today, her organization is helping over 100 veterans.
“People are going to slip through the cracks in our community, and we just, we just can’t have it happen. Especially our veterans. Yeah, they gave it all so we need to give our all,” Garrison said.
Passageways is raising money to get a veteran home for women. For more on Passageways, click here.