Thank you once again for your support of The Essentials Fund (TEF) in 2023! As we look back at our second year of fundraising and granting, we are so appreciative of you, our donors, for your continued support! Because of your generosity, we were able to provide an unrestricted grant of $2900 to each of the following 14 Waterloo Region non-profit organizations who provide much needed vital services and programming throughout our community!
- Brain Injury Association of Waterloo Wellington
- Camino Well Being and Mental Health
- Canadian Arab Women’s Association
- Community Justice Initiatives
- Family and Children Services of the Waterloo Region Foundation
- Porchlight Counselling and Addition Services
- Sanguen Health Centre
- Send’em Off Smiling
- Sexual Assault Support Centre
- SHORE Centre
- SHOW – Supportive Housing of Waterloo
- Somali Canadian Association of Waterloo Region
- Waterloo Region Family Network
- Women’s Crisis Services of Waterloo Region
In October, committee members reached out to the grant recipients to ask for feedback on the application process (our goal is to keep it as simple as possible) as well as the impact the grant in helping to support their clients’ essentials needs. We are pleased to provide some responses below highlighting the need for this support and their appreciation for your generosity.
“The $2,900 received this year from The Essentials Fund assisted with the Sexual Assault Support Centre of Waterloo Region being able to continue to provide basic essentials for our clients in the community. We were able to help clients with bus tickets to get to and from appointments, help provide food, clothing and hygiene products. With some of our clients being precariously housed the ability to help in this way is so very important. We would like to thank you for your support for our Centre and our Community.”
Sexual Assault Support Centre
“Throughout the pandemic, CJI’s Stride program, along with every other community program, was prevented from entering Grand Valley Intuition for Women. People inside prison were completely disconnected from community supports for over three years. With no ability to run our program inside the prison, Stride lost its main source of funding. Yet, the need for reintegration support remained pressing. Women were leaving prison with no winter clothing, hygiene nor the support of a Circle that would have typically been built during Stride Night. During this time, Stride relied on grants and donors to be able to meet these needs. Grants, such as that of the Essentials Fund, allowed Stride to provide women leaving prison with these essential and practical items. Staff met with women upon their release with a knapsack filled with items such as clothing, hygiene items, resource lists and grocery gift cards. This allowed women to return to community with dignity, being able to feel good about how they presented themselves and having access to the food they needed to feel at their best.”
Community Justice Initiatives
“Waterloo Region Family Network is extremely grateful for the funding we received through The Essentials Fund. In our work, we often support families who have difficulty providing essential items for their loved ones at various and unexpected times. To date, we have been able to support families in need with gift cards for groceries, clothing, and back-to-school supplies in a respectful, confidential, and personal way. These families have expressed gratitude for this support. We are thankful that such a fund exists. Thank you for making a difference in our community.
Waterloo Region Family Network
“The KW Van program and the community members we serve in the Waterloo region are grateful to receive the Essential Funds Grant. Being a non-profit, our budget is limited for what we can purchase. We are getting over 1000 visits to our program monthly, and struggle to provide items people desperately need. Being able to purchase items like sunscreen and water in the summer and gloves/hats in the winter, we would consider life saving. Every dollar gets spent on items we know people need to survive outside as well as items needed for every day basic needs like snacks and drinks. With this grant we can continue connecting with community through food/items and provide wrap-around support.”
Sanguen Health Centre
“The support we received from The Essentials Fund made a true impact on those we serve in our young parent programs. Our young mothers face many barriers to meeting their own basic needs and require our help to make ends meet. “Monica Mart” was an in-house store that was created to help these young mothers in accessing the things they need. Monica Mart relies exclusively on donations to operate, and over time the store needed additional support to continue to meet the needs of those we serve. With the support of the Essentials Fund, and with the leadership of one of our supervisors, in collaboration with our youth, Monica Mart was re-imagined. Old, unwanted items were removed, and the entire space was cleaned, brightened, and organized. New items that the youth need and want were brought in, and they were involved in the design of the shop and creating the displays. The youth chose a new name and called it “The Little Camino Shop”. They are going to create branding and they even have an app to track the money they’ve earned and spent. Youth also work in the shop to earn money for spending there. They stock, organize, and maintain its inventory. The shop is often a place for our participants to chat, socialize and sometimes share life challenges with staff and each other that they problem solve together.
Camino Well Being and Mental Health
This meaningful work would not be possible without the support of The Essentials Fund, we are truly grateful.
Somali Canadians of Waterloo Region often struggle to get the support they need from larger organizations due to various systemic barriers, whether that is language, cultural differences, or just needing to navigate and connect with multiple levels of government that are all already strained. They rely on SCAWR to connect them with much needed resources and community.
Somali Canadian Association of Waterloo Region
The Essentials Fund gave us some discretionary funds to give to the families we serve to alleviate the stress of items they would otherwise struggle to access. Through this fund, we were able to provide 29 families with Walmart gift cards which gave them the autonomy of purchasing what they deemed necessary for their families including food, clothing, baby items, bus tickets, menstrual products etc.
“Residents in both Porchlight’s Recovery houses had the opportunity to purchase some decent undergarments thanks to the Essentials Fund. Bras, socks, and underwear are items that have greatly improved their overall wellbeing. We have also used this funding to able to supply birth certificates and other documents necessary to open bank accounts. These are additional expenses that present barriers for our residents and we truly appreciate the flexibility the Essentials Fund offers.”
Porchlight Counselling and Addition Services
“Through the Essentials Fund we are able to provide community members with needed daily material supports which are often expensive and inaccessible despite their necessity. This includes diapers, formula, wipes, menstrual products and related items- all essential items which carry a high cost and can often mean choosing between paying other bills or buying groceries and having the care products needed.”
SHORE Centre
As noted above, your support and donation has made a significant difference to many organizations helping our most vulnerable community members. Please know your generosity is greatly appreciated. We also want to express our thanks to the Waterloo Region Community Foundation for their continued support and providing invaluable administrative support.
The Essentials Fund 2024 fundraising campaign will kick off on Wednesday, March 20, the first day of Spring and run until April 30th! It is our goal to continue to grow the Fund to provide more funding to more organizations to help support their clients needs. Donations are accepted anytime during the year at www.wrcf.ca/essentialsfund if you would like to make a year-end donation and receive a tax receipt.
Best wishes for a lovely holiday season and a happy and healthy 2024 from The Essentials Fund Organizing Committee!
Jane Arnold, Allyson Kroetsch, Claire Anderson, Tom Galloway, Mike Pereira, Eleanor McGrath, Laura Galbraith, Holly Manning, Kany Doski, Anna Beard and Rose Greensides
The Essentials Fund 