A local non profit organization that helped fire victims and others who needed assistance.has closed its doors.
Over a month ago, Big Hearts, Small City Founder Jason Surette announced that the organizations would be closing its doors, due to a lack of funds and volunteers..
But after only receiving $320 in donations since then, Surette says they have officially closed their doors.
He says they have helped thousands of of people over the past 6 years, “We’ve helped over 500 fire victims in New Brunswick with rapid rehousing and other supports. Over 1000 beds have been given to people in Greater Moncton. All of the services we provided were things that no one else was doing so it is definitely going to leave a gap in resources.”
He says finding volunteers and getting donations has been a major challenge. He feels it is because so many groups are asking for donations, “There have been so many organizations that there just isn’t enough money to go around to everyone of the, I find in Moncton that there is a lot of duplication of services and that has a huge strain on financial donations from the public.”
Surette says they’ll be donating their assets to other groups in the community.
“Our van is going to Greentrade New Brunswick. Our mattresses are going to be donated to other organizations around the province. Everything that we have at our warehouse will be going to EnviroPlus, and office equipment will be going to YWCA Moncton and Habitat for Humanity.”
As for what’s next for Surette, he says it is time to start taking care of himself, “After doing so much work and volunteering for most of my life, this was one of the biggest things I created in my lifetime, but it just didn’t work out.”
