Return to Top Of PageOperation: How Does The Out Of The Cold Program Work?

The goal of the "Out Of The Cold" program is to provide shelter during the winter months. It enlists the support of a variety of different sites with varied backgrounds to provide temporary shelter on a night to night rotating basis. Each site will take a day of the week to provide a hot meal and overnight shelter for their guests. The program runs from the beginning of November to the end of March. Each site is responsible for the scheduling of its volunteers, arranging the food and physical resources and its routine service operation.

Adequate and consistent volunteer staffing is the cornerstone of a successful operation. The volunteer base is drawn from the site and the community at large. Volunteers are needed for shopping, cooking, serving, supervising during the night and a clean up crew in the morning.

Return to Top Of PageMaking A Donation To The Program

Each individual site is run independantly as an outreach project of the site. Funding is provided by the site, other churches, community groups and interested individuals. It is the responsibility of the individual site to control all finances needed. This includes fund raising, purchasing, issueing income tax receipts if possible, etc. This means that you must decide which site gets your donation. For example, to donate to the program at First United, Waterloo, you would make your check out to First United Church - Out of the Cold. Thus the donation goes to a designated fund at First for use by the Out of the Cold program only. (The registered charity is the church where you make your donation.)

There is no easy way to donate to all sites, as there is no overall umbrella group. To donate to all sites, you would issue a cheque for each site individually.

Return to Top Of PageHistory

In 1986, the death of George, a homeless man befriended by the students and staff of St. Michael's High School in Toronto, brought people together to take action. Students and staff at the school, Sister Susan Moran, Father John Murphy and the Reverend Canon John Erb, took necessary steps to arrange a location, food and volunteers. On January 15, 1988 they opened a small storefront on St. Clair Avenue in Toronto.

Without specifically planning so, the first provision of service also revealed the special nature of the service for both the volunteers and guests. Each group grew in humanity by participating in the program; the guest by experiencing from the volunteers a genuine concern; and the volunteers, by learning to earn the respect and appreciation of the guests.

By word of mouth and a "grass roots" growth in interest, the program has continued to expand and develop to address the need and increase awareness of homelessness. Toronto has over 45 locations and more than 5,000 volunteers that provide meals, shelter, clothing and other services. These include a wide variety of settings: churches, synagogues, centers and even a home. In addition, London, Ottawa, St. Catherines, Niagara Falls are a few of the other cities who have started programs of their own.

Return to Top Of PageHistory in Kitchener-Waterloo

In February of 1999, a two month pilot project was run at First United Church, Waterloo. In the fall of 1999, three more churches opened their doors to the homeless. In January of 2000 another church opened its doors to provide overnight shelter only. We have had seven churches available for the program since the fall of 2000.

Return to Top Of PageSteering Committee

A community-wide Out Of The Cold Steering Committee is composed of the coordinator(s) or their designate(s) who meet a few times a year. It exists to aid in providing training, coordinating information sessions, and overseeing the successful operation of the overall program in the community.