An armful of Rolling Stones cassette tapes flew from the window of Charley Capoeman’s truck, clattering on the asphalt of a wooded coastal highway as he sped away from the fish hatchery.

He felt compelled in the moment to get rid of the brand new plastic cases, realizing only later that he had littered.

Earlier that day he had knelt on the floor of the hatchery bathroom and prayed for forgiveness from God. It couldn’t wait until after work, he said.

When he arrived at the door of his house, his wife, Leslie, greeted him in tears. She, too, had felt a powerful urge to pray on the living room floor that day.

“Our lives changed after that,” Leslie said.

Thirty-five years later, in January 2023, Capoeman became the newest executive director of the Union Gospel Mission of Grays Harbor, taking the reins on a long-standing provider of human services as he guides the nonprofit’s faith-based approach to addressing homelessness.

As he takes over, he follows three-and-a-half decades of leadership from former Executive Director Gary Rowell.

Capoeman first ran into Rowell at the Central Park Neighborhood Church. The two stood side by side on stage during worship — Rowell plucking the bass and Capoeman playing electric guitar. Sometimes during services Capoeman would sit next to Rowell, who brought men from the Union Gospel Mission.

“I would talk to some of the men, just because I was curious about them, and I didn’t know what was going on here (at the mission),” he said.

Capoeman frequently talked to one man who often shared stories about his life of drinking and living on the streets.

“I think about eight or nine months later, he wasn’t talking about his old life anymore,” Capoeman said. “He started talking about the Lord. It made me think, what’s going on with the Union Gospel? What made this man change?”

The man for the job

Capoeman, a Quinault tribal member, grew up in Taholah on the Quinault Indian Nation reservation. He comes from a family of wood carvers, and selling wood carvings was his original retirement plan after working for 20 years as a forester for the tribe and the Bureau of Indian Affairs.

Capoeman’s childhood had little religious influence except a few Sunday school lessons and a grandmother who attended the Shaker Church in Taholah.

It was one life in crisis that first opened his eyes to religion, which would eventually move him to pray below the hatchery sink and ditch the Rolling Stones tapes.

When Capoeman’s brother developed a drug addiction and became separated from the family, Capoeman felt there was no way to help. But after the brother began attending church services Capoeman noticed a change in his behavior.

“He came by and visited us, and he wasn’t the same man,” Capoeman said. “He had joy, peace and was full of life.”

It led Capoeman to become more involved with the church, and eventually to develop a passion for working with other lives in crisis by delivering ministry at Stafford Creek Corrections Center and Grays Harbor County Jail.

After building relationships with guests and others at the mission, Capoeman joined the board of directors at Rowell’s request. At early meetings he observed how closely the board followed and worked with Rowell, and noticed the “very sincere, very thorough” discussions around business at the mission.

“I was a quiet person, I just listened,” Capoeman said. “That’s kind of who I am, I just listened and observed.”

He served on the board for 15 years before Rowell announced last September he would be retiring at the end of the year.

“I thought ‘Wow, I don’t know who’s going to be his replacement,’” Capoeman said, laughing.

He said he knew the executive director was a great responsibility. Two weeks later he got a phone call from Rowell.

“I think you’re the man for the job,” Rowell said.

Prior to that call, taking the executive director position hadn’t crossed Capoeman’s mind. Despite years on the board, he didn’t have leadership experience with the church. It took him two weeks to think and pray about the decision before accepting.

It also took Capoeman a little while, after taking office, to transition from working with trees everyday to working with people. The first five months after taking over were filled with daily one-on-one Bible study meetings with shelter guests — similar to the work he performed in jail ministry.

“My goal was to bring them closer to Christ, always. And it’s the same way here,” Capoeman said.

A staple of service and structure

Not only is Capoeman filling the hole created by Rowell’s departure, but continuing what’s been a staple of service in Aberdeen for a large part of a century.

What would become the Union Gospel Mission in 1938 started as a soup kitchen in the early 1930s. Two women, Else Johnson and Esther Sawyer, opened the Lighthouse Mission — providing inspiration for the group’s present day lighthouse logo — with the intent to “feed and shelter the less fortunate and also share a better way of life,” according to the organization’s website. The effort grew when churches stepped in to provide supplies and deliver gospel services.

A network of churches, along with community donations, still supports the mission today. At both its 40-bed men’s shelter building on Heron Street and its 35-bed women and children’s shelter, called the Friendship House, the mission provides meals, shelter, clothing, showers, prayers and other services to homeless people.

That effort is similar to Union Gospel Mission organizations in other cities, but the local chapter is self-governed, and the money doesn’t leave Grays Harbor. Barring a few capital projects, the mission does not rely on government grants, said Laurel Wiitala, chief of operations at the mission.

That’s partly because of certain rules: Overnight guests must follow a routine each day by making their beds, showering, doing chores, eating meals and attending a Bible study, and drugs and alcohol are not allowed.

Wiitala said the mission’s structure has received criticism in the past.

“We do it because we want a safe place for them to come,” she said. “We want this to be a refuge, both facilities, that they’re not in danger, that they don’t have to worry somebody’s going to stop them in the bathroom and sell them some dope.”

Wiitala said the more rigid structure has deterred some homeless people from staying overnight at the shelter. She said that while the number of meals served at the mission have increased in recent years, the number of full beds on average has stayed about the same. The mission encourages people to shelter there — the longer they do, Wiitala said, the higher chance they stay out of homelessness when they leave.

“It’s pretty hard to get your life in order when you’re living out there. Our hope is that they would stay with us, and I think that’s one of the challenges is that we can keep them long enough,” Wiitala said.

Wiitala said the mission is happy to continue providing meals and showers, but hopes more people will enroll in the year-long New Foundations program, a biblically-based effort to address the “root cause” of homelessness.

“If there’s an addiction, certainly you have to deal with addiction, but we’re going after what the source of the issues are,” Wiitala said. “Many of the men and women we serve have had trauma in their life as children. We’re not licensed counselors or anything like that. But trying to help them get past the focus of the addiction and trying to just help them get on their feet and understand there’s hope for their life, that their lives can be changed.”

Capoeman, who works to guide people through the program, said he’s already seen that change in people staying at the mission, like some who complete the program and then get hired on as staff. The mission also runs a furniture bank to accommodate those moving into housing.

In addition to working with guests, Capoeman is guiding the mission through a bathroom renovation and addition in its upstairs shelter space, which will soon have three toilets instead of two, and add two showers, making accommodations more comfortable, Capoeman said. The mission is looking for community donations to help support the project, he said.

The blueprints are piled on his desk, two acoustic guitars hanging above on the wall.

Contact reporter Clayton Franke at 406-552-3917 or clayton.franke@thedailyworld.com.