GREEN COVE SPRINGS – The large pile of sand, smoothly plowed dirt and construction silt fence around a portion of the future Vineyard Transitional Center was the perfect backdrop for supporters of the annual Boston Butt fundraiser as they picked up their smokey delights Saturday.

Work started days before Pastor John Sanders, Joseph Smith, and a significant group of volunteers fired up a large smoker to serve 472 Boston Butts in one of the nonprofit’s largest fundraisers of the year.

Challenge Enterprises provided a refrigerated trailer which allowed Sanders and Smith to make one trip Wednesday to deliver the pork butts to the center at 518 Pine St. instead of the two spending four hours making trips transferring nearly 3,500 pounds of meat to the center.

They lit the fire at 6:30 a.m. on Thursday and didn’t stop smoking meat until early Saturday.

Business orders were delivered on Friday, and individual orders were picked up at the center on Saturday, which meant the cooks and volunteers only took a two-hour break in nearly two days.

“Jimmy Weeks and James Padgett told us how to do it, and we had a lot of help,” Smith said. “We had 15 people from Southern Roofer and Renovations who volunteered to help prep the butts and apply the seasoning. They also bought some of the butts. Russell McNair volunteered. AMIkids volunteered. So did Black Rifle Coffee. The community really came out and supported this.”

The new Vineyard Transitional Center has been 15 years in the making. Sanders said that foundation work started last week, and wall construction will start in January.

Once completed, it will provide individual rooms for as many as 12 newly released Clay County Jail inmates. Their transitional program will start in the last few months of incarceration and continue at the center so they can get life and job skills training, job placement assistance, and community support referrals, allowing them to be an asset to the community and return to their families.

“We’re called the Home of the Second Chances,” Smith said. “Once they come here, we want to break that generational curse.”

Studies have shown that one-third of inmates without transitional training usually return to jail. However, inmates who complete training at facilities like The Vineyard are only 8% likely to be arrested again.