YMCA ReConnect is helping to bring the many homeless organizations together with one central locations for donations.
Senior Director for Outreach Services Trevor Goodwin says “We put in a request to the City of Moncton and asked if there was a space available that we could use for the winter months, so that all of the organizations through the Greater Moncton Homelessness Steering Committee could put their donations. It would just be a central stopping point.”
ReConnect has signed a lease with the Moncton Tennis Club to use their space for the winter.
Donations of things like clothing, footwear, household items, blankets and toiletries, will be stored there.
Goodwin says, “So people can still donate wherever they choose and then we just take everything to the Tennis Club location. It is catalogued and sorted out so we know what we have, and we know what is coming in and what is going out. Sometimes agencies are either left with a surplus of items or a deficit and that leaves our clients needing to go to multiple agencies for each item. ”
He says this will reduce the amount of time needed to get members of the homeless community what they need, “They can now just ask any agency that they come in contact with. They can tell them they are in need of this, instead of having to go to three or four locations to get items, any one of those agencies can simply contact ReConnect.”
