The Momentum Center opened in February 2017. It was not created by the effort of a grassroots group of citizens who recognized a community need, but rather created and funded behind-the-scenes by Community Mental Health of Ottawa County.
Ottawa County Community Mental Health created a request for proposal to entities interested in creating social recreation opportunities. The Momentum Center responded to this request for proposal.
Although it operates under the name Momentum Center, the business name is Extended Grace. Extended Grace was operating when the Momentum Center formed. In the proposal paperwork, Extended Grace is identified as a “social lab” that focuses on social justice, as well as a “new expression of a previous church to marginalized people.”
To pursue the social lab experiments, Extended Grace was in the process of partnering with Grand Valley State University for research purposes when the proposal for the Momentum Center was submitted to CMHOC.
According to the proposal, Extended Grace had been working with CMHOC for over a year in preparation for creating the Momentum Center.
The plan was for CMH staff to run the Momentum Center for the first six months and for Ottawa County CMH to provide funding for the remodeling of the building which would house the Momentum Center.
Once the Momentum Center was established, they planned to be self-sustaining through coffee shop and retail store sales as well as from grants and donations from corporate donors. But given the continuous appearances at county board meetings from Momentum Center staff and volunteers over the last few years requesting the county’s continuing support, either this has not happened or they really like receiving monthly payments from the county.
Today, the Momentum Center receives $22,500 of funding per month from Ottawa County and also receives a significant amount of funding from the Grand Haven Community Foundation. Along with the social recreational activities they offer to people with mental illness, they continue to collect data, study people, operate an anti-racism task force, and offer cultural immersion vacations, including a recent November 2023 trip to Morocco.
Currently, Community Mental Health Ottawa County is evaluating this program to determine if the contract should be extended for another year.
It is stunning to me that Ottawa County and generous residents (through donations to entities such as the Grand Haven Community Foundation) would knowingly support an organization that was clearly created through a behind-the-scenes partnership, claims to help the mentally ill even though it does not employ any licensed counselors, and focuses on anti-American activist forms of social justice and anti-racism; all while going on cultural excursions around the world. No wonder Momentum Center staff seem to be panicking.