Homeless people in Timmins spent two nights and two days over the weekend under an extreme cold weather alert… and a stepped-up operation to keep them warm, fed and safe.
The coordinator of the Living Space shelter – Jason Sereda — is impressed with how smoothly everything went.
“Very smooth, actually,” he comments.
Due to dangerously cold conditions and a shortage of room at its Cedar Street facility, Living Space was only open 8:30am-5:00pm, when it moved operations to the Native Friendship Centre on Kirby Avenue. There, the homeless were fed and allowed to stay the night, until Living Space opened again in the morning.
“So it really gave us an opportunity to push the boundaries of our program and forced us to expand our day operations, which I think is fantastic,” says Sereda.
He adds that the weekend experience also underlined the ongoing need for volunteers at Living Space.
“We had more people in the space and we were trying to provide more meal support. It was handy just having volunteers here so that they can relieve some of the tasks that staff do, and give us a bit of a break so we can concentrate on supporting the clients versus making coffee.
You can volunteer by going to livingspacehub.org.