ANDERSON — The line outside the doors keeps growing longer at Clean Start in downtown Anderson.

With those increasing numbers, the budget and donations keeping this nonprofit afloat are holding steady, but there’s one way to free up more of their budget, said the charity’s manager, Norene Smith.

That way is eliminating the monthly rent payment. So that’s why the Clean Start of Anderson has kicked off a capital campaign to raise the $100,000 they need to buy outright the building in which they operate.

“Just a couple of weeks ago, we had 17 people when we opened the door,” Smith said. “We’ve had 28 or 29 people each day for the last four weeks.”

Clean Start of Anderson is an agency that started with the help of St. Mary of the Angels Catholic Church on White Street in Anderson two years ago. The mission: provide a place for those needing clean clothes and a hot shower to have those needs met.

So three days a week, Smith and her band of volunteers, including two barbers — Adam Bryant and Phil McCombs — come to this small concrete-block building on Townsend Street and do just that.

It is a place to come clean, something that is often out of reach for a homeless person. The overall goal is to help those who come in here find work, to make a clean start.

There are shower stalls, bathrooms and industrial-sized washers and dryers along one wall. A storage room has shelves of shampoo, deodorant, lotions, soap — any hygiene products one could need. Donated clothes hang from racks and shoes ready for new owners line the floor.

The goal, Smith said, is to own the building by 2010. Right now, the nonprofit operates on roughly $1,600 a month. That’s basically costs for the rent and the utilities, said Russ Dennis, volunteer and governing board member for Clean Start.

No one is paid at the organization, even Smith, who is here every day, all day when the operation is open.

“When we opened this place two years ago, we had about 14 or 15 people coming in, on average,” Dennis said. “Now we average 25 a day.”