C Sharp - Casey Ready and Charlie Martin
We are excited to put our names forward to join the Juke Box Heroes challenge to raise funds for CCRC (Community Counselling and Resource Centre). All funds raised will go toward preventing homelessness and supporting other services of CCRC.
Casey Ready is the Executive Director and Charlie Martin is the President of CCRC. They have teamed up to share the impact of CCRC with the community, and to try to compete to become CCRC's Juke Box Heroes!
We chose to focus our team's donations toward CCRC's Housing Resource Centre, which helps people who are experiencing housing instability, because housing makes up a foundational part of our community's wellbeing.
I was walking down the hall after a meeting at CCRC, with about half an hour to closing, when I overheard one of the Housing Counsellors say across the hall to another colleague, “I have 5 more voicemail messages to get through, but I just got one from someone who is going to have their hydro shut off tonight. I don’t think I am going to be able to resolve it before the weekend.”
I tried to imagine what it must feel like to have to go home every weekend, knowing there were some people we just didn’t have the time to help. Then I tried to imagine what it was going to be like for the family who might not be reached in time to prevent a hydro shut off. What were they going to eat without a stove or microwave to heat food properly? Beyond that evening, how much food would go to waste once the refrigerator shut off? How were the children of the household going to be able to do their weekend homework assignments when lights went out? How would the parents react when the TV didn’t turn on when all they would have liked to do was watch a movie to unwind from the stress of work and making ends meet?
It was then I realized that with just one more person working with CCRC’s Housing Resource Centre we could ensure CCRC clients calls are received and responded to in a timely fashion. All of CCRC’s competent, dedicated staff are working at full speed, yet the needs they encounter continue to exceed their capacity.
One missed opportunity to advocate for a client, or make a one-time emergency payment toward an overdue bill might have led to many other impacts that are beyond our knowledge or imagination. We can never know all the factors caused by a busy workload. I couldn’t help but think – this is preventable. One call could have made such a difference for that family that weekend.
Please sponsor us to help us reach our goal by Friday, April 27th, when we hope to win the title of Juke Box Heroes!
*All donations will receive a charitable tax receipt from CCRC*
