We are in the process of completing a sponsorship application for a young single woman from Syria who is living in Lebanon and has family members in Ottawa.
We also plan to complete an application for another family from Syria, who also have family here in Ottawa. We are still trying to access the name of a family to sponsor through government channels, but have not yet been successful.
With refugees starting to arrive in Canada this week, we hope to have more information soon, but at this point we have no idea when or how many people we will support, or what their specific needs are. We are keeping a database of everyone who is offering support, and we will contact people when we have more information, especially when we hear of possible arrivals.
A group of people in our area has been collecting household items, clothing, etc. to support Syrian refugee families, expecting they would have arrived by now. As you are probably aware, very few have arrived in Ottawa to this point. The donations are in boxes taking up considerable room in a person’s garage, however the person would like use of the garage when the snow comes.
CDS Storage in Stittsville has generously offered to provide us space for a few months. We plan to make the move on Monday December 21 at 4:00 pm. We have a truck and an SUV. Another truck would be good or a couple of equivalent vehicles. Two or three more people to help load and unload would be great too. The move will be from northwest Kanata (near Canadian Tire) to Stittsville (off Hazledean near Cabotto’s Restaurant). Let me know if you are able to lend a hand.
(Rev. Grant Dillenbeck from Stittsville United Church chairs the Kanata Stittsville Refugee Sponsorship Group. He can be reached at 613-836-4962.)