Dear Friends,
It is with both a heavy but happy heart I give our year end report for Manna Homeless Society.
What a horrendous, miserable year it has been with such a wet summer and fall to the most brutal cold and snowy winter. For our street workers it has been a nightmare dealing with the most awful situations that you could imagine in our community to bring hope to the less fortunate when dealing with such extreme weather conditions.
Manna’s work load has increased but so have our volunteers. This has truly been a blessing as we could not do this work without the help of these dedicated individuals. We have a few professional people such as doctors, nurses, retired social workers and spiritual advisers assisting us at the street level now. We have caring trained people who have been assisting us in our storage buildings, picking up and purchasing items and working on the front lines.
But none of this could be done without the generous financial gifts and goods given to Manna Homeless Society this year by people like yourself. We cannot thank this community enough for stepping up and meeting the needs of the everyday residents who are down on their luck, to the elderly, and the women and youth in the Oceanside area. You are such a blessing and I would like to take this time to thank you on behalf of the people on the street and the less fortunate. We take our volunteer role seriously giving 150% to distribute the goods the community has provided to the needy. Again you know who you are and so do we. So thank you again ever so much.
I want you to know we are finding that our van isn’t big enough for our community service which we provide 7 days a week. We need to use our Manna van and a couple cars just for setting up with the very basics on Saturday.
Manna needs a large cube van for pickups plus the additional space is needed so it can be properly stocked to assist our residents. Our society is now in the process of searching for and fundraising for a newer, good running cube van that will meet our needs. The small van will continue to be used on call outs keeping the running costs down.
I am pleased to report on the number of goods we have been able to share with our community residents. In 2016 we distributed 134 tents, 199 tarps, 305 sleeping bags, 89 blankets, 5,306 survival packs, 5,260 bags of groceries, 80 bikes plus a huge number of coats, socks, gloves, hats, personals for men and women and just about everything else you can think of to survive in this brutal environment.
What a caring community Oceanside has been over this past year and especially during the Christmas season. You have assisted in building a healthier, compassionate and safer community for all people in the Oceanside area. As individuals you have done more than what our government has turned their back on.
Until we have affordable housing in our area, as well as an all weather shelter we will continue to see this atrocity and failure grow in our community.
It is unfortunate that the community also has naysayers, people who would be unreasonably happy if the less fortunate were rounded up and shipped off. This is not going to happen. The homeless are becoming visible which makes these people uncomfortable.
Without Manna providing services to the less fortunate their plight would go unnoticed. The government has turned their backs on the homeless and now there is a natural consequence to this delinquent behaviour.
Manna Homeless Society will continue the fight and be the lifeline, the 911 of the street to the less fortunate and impoverished people of Oceanside. This will bring hope to those who need it and we’ll have a safer, healthier community for all of our residents.
Remember at one time these people weren’t always hated and shunned. They were loved and the apple of some mother’s eye.
If you are able to continue to support Manna especially funding for the cube van, we are most appreciative.
Wishing you the best in 2017,
Sincerely,
Robin Campbell
President