The executive director of a Chapel Hill organization dedicated to providing shelter and other services to those in need is passing the mantle to a new leader next month.

John Dorward served as executive director of the the Inter-Faith Council for Social Service for the past two years, after working with the organization for more than a decade. He’s rightfully proud of the SECU Community House – a homeless shelter for men – that will officially open in Chapel Hill in late September.

“One of the first things that I started working on when I came here – I’m on my 13th year now – was coming up with a new space, and being able to actually build a men’s shelter for the first time,” said Dorward.

Dorward said he’s proud that IFC has made it through the recent recession without cutting services. If anything, he said, the numbers of people served by IFC actually went up over the past few years. The organization managed to find the funding.

Newly appointed Executive Director Michael Reinke starts his job on Aug.17. Dorward said he’s happy with the change.

“I was supposed to retire a couple of years ago,” said Dorward. “But Chris Moran, who was the previous executive director here at the IFC, ran into some medical issues that came up, and he decided that it was time for him to step down.

“And so, we kind of looked around, and I seemed to be the right choice.”

IFC was just starting its capital campaign for the Community House at the time Dorward took the helm.

Prior to that, Dorward was named associate director in 2007. Most of his professional career has been spent working for non-profits. He joined IFC after working 23 years for Ipas.

The Chapel Hill organization works on women’s reproductive health projects, mostly in the developing world.

Dorward said that when he started at Ipas, the annual budget was around $500,000 a year. Over time, he saw it grow to around $19 million.

“It had gotten so large that it was like working for an IBM or somebody like that,” said Dorward. “Almost all the work was overseas, and I ran the operational side here. So I never really interacted with the people that we were helping.”

So he amicably left Ipas to take a job as finance director with IFC. Now, whenever he’s having a bad day, he can directly thank the community he works with for lifting his spirits.

“I can always walk downstairs, or go to any of our other facilities, and talk to the people that we’re working with, and that we’re helping,” said Dorward, “and it always makes me feel better about it. When I go home at the end of the day, no matter what else I got done that day, I know that we made a difference in somebody’s life.”

Dorward said he’d like to continue working for IFC as a volunteer, and he praised his replacement, Michael Reinke.

“I think he is much more qualified than I ever was to be able to fill this role,” said Dorward. “I keep telling people that we’re giving you an upgrade. I really, truly believe that. He has the educational background and the work background. I mean, he started off as an executive director running homeless shelters, and community kitchens.”

Reinke, who holds M.B.A. and Master of Divinity degrees, has worked for the past 20 years as executive director of four local and statewide nonprofit organizations.

The ribbon-cutting ceremony for the SECU Community House takes place Sept. 21.

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