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The beds for Collingwood’s emergency homeless shelter, slated to open this November, have arrived.
The sleeping mats and blankets arrived in Collingwood yesterday, a donation from the David Busby Centre in Barrie.
The mats and blankets were formerly used for the Barrie Out of the Cold initiative, which operated for the last 20 years using Barrie churches as temporary overnight shelters.
The Barrie Out of the Cold group dissolved and the Busby Centre has taken over the responsibility of providing emergency overnight shelter in a new hub built for the purpose. There are cots set up, so the centre was left with a surplus of sleeping mats collected from the five churches serving as temporary shelters.
When Sara Peddle, executive director of the Busby Centre, and chair of the Simcoe County Alliance to End Homelessness heard about the new Out of the Cold shelter in Collingwood, she offered the mats and blankets.
“We wanted to share some of these assets to help Collingwood get started,” said Peddle.
Pam Hillier of Community Connection (211) received the donation on behalf of Collingwood’s Out of the Cold initiative. She said the mats will be perfect because they’re easy to store, set up, and pack up each day.
Peddle brought 28 mats and 25 blankets for Collingwood’s emergency shelter. Hillier said the Out of the Cold group is planning to set up 10 beds by November.
Thanks to a $75,000 commitment of funding from the town of Collingwood, the group will be able to hire a full-time shelter coordinator and will have two shifts of staff for the shelter while it’s being used through the night.
“We have to build trust,” said Hillier of the shelter. “We have to establish it as a safe place.”
The group will be working with local service providers to identify those who might need emergency shelter overnight in the winter.
There will also be an intake process for those using the shelter, which will include information on how to access services such as dental care, foot care, and hair care.
Peddle said she’s seen nights where 78 people are accessing the emergency shelter overnight in the winter.
“We hope to have Collingwood up and running will alleviate some of the pressure and demand in the urban centres,” she said. “We are in an affordable housing crisis in Simcoe County, and a community response is going to create community results … that means the whole region.”
According to Hillier, the Collingwood Out of the Cold group plans to run a temporary shelter - using local churches - for three years, before having a permanent space for an emergency shelter.
Currently, the Out of the Cold effort in Collingwood is accepting only cash donations. Hillier said when the group is closer to opening the shelter, they will put a call out for specific supplies. Until then, they don’t have storage space for physical donations.
You can donate online here, and you can follow the Collingwood Out of the Cold Facebook page for updates on the project.
