Updated with correction.
By day, Joseph Ratterman, chairman of BATS Global Markets Inc., helps run some of the world's most complex trading venues.
But on Monday nights, for the past 12 years, he's been behind the wheel of the Vittle Van, a truck delivering food to the homeless in BATS' hometown of Kansas City, Mo. He and his wife, Sandy, founded Hope in the Streets in 2004 to deliver food to people Mr. Ratterman calls the “chronic homeless.”
Mr. Ratterman said he's driven the Vittle Van about 90% of the time since he began the program, missing only the times when work would take him out of town.
Now, he's bringing a new traveling ministry to the homeless in downtown Kansas City. Called the Worship Wagon, it brings a minister and musicians to provide a non-denominational religious service on a street corner just blocks from the Missouri River in a warehouse district of Kansas City.
“It's a church in a box,” Mr. Ratterman said.
On any given night, from 80 to 100 people are served by the Vittle Van, and another 40 to 50 people attend services delivered by the Worship Wagon.
“We target the hard-core, chronic homeless. Not those who stay in shelters or who are temporarily on the streets,” Mr. Ratterman said. “There are people who've spent their lifetimes on the streets. It's a targeted, discreet program.”
