THUNDER BAY — The United Way of Thunder Bay is making an urgent plea, after it's latest campaign collected only $1.6 million, about $230,000 short of last year's goal.
Over the past six years, the total shortfall has added up to $1 million.
United Way of Thunder Bay CEO Albert Brulé on Thursday said without the additional money, tough decisions impacting organizations throughout the community will have to be made.
Brulé has extended the deadline for donations to the 2022 campaign until Feb. 28, when the board of directors will have to decide whether to cut out donor organizations from this year’s funding pot, or give a pro-rated amount to the organizations it currently supports.
“Hard choices will have to be made,” he said, making a last-ditch plea to the community for help.
Brulé said it’s a combination of circumstances that have led to the slowdown in donations. Employee campaigns, which have been the heart and soul of the annual campaign effort, have slowed down, with more employees working remotely, downsizing and fewer events, in part because of the impact of the recent pandemic.
The local United Way has also stopped publicizing its annual target in recent years and making repeated appeals through the media during the campaign time-frame, which Brulé admitted could also be having an impact.
“We are not alone. United Ways across the country have been seeing a decline in certain kinds of donations, particularly employee campaigns,” Brulé said. “For larger organizations, some of them have actually moved away from the United Way and gone to third-party platforms like Benevity and Canada Helps. So, employees can choose from 85,000 charities across Canada.
“COVID had an impact, the ability to be able to go in and rally employees to do team-building, to do events in the workplace, to host a breakfast. That was completely shut down and even now, just coming out of COVID, we’re finding it challenging to go into those workplaces.”
Brulé said it won’t be easy to pick and choose who gets money and how much, but a number of factors will be considered before any decisions are made, including the impact and the kind of impact giving or not giving would have on the community.
Programs the United Way of Thunder Bay services provide food hampers to seniors, emergency child care for low-income families and counselling for at-risk youth, to name just a few.
“Asking for help takes courage,” Brulé said. “We want to be there.”
Michael Quibell, the executive director at the Dew Drop Inn, a Thunder Bay soup kitchen, said having their funding cut, or worse, eliminated, would be devastating to his organization.
“With an organization that depends so much on community support, any disruption in that support would be noticed,” he said. “It would affect us. How much, I’m not sure, but it would definitely be noticeable.”
Formally, the annual campaign ends on Dec. 31 of a given year, but because the United Way of Thunder Bay is coming up short, Brulé said he asked the board for permission to extend the deadline, noting the first three months of the year usually don’t have much of an impact on the amount of money brought in.
“What we’ve asked is for the board to allow us to make this final appeal, to encourage people, particularly some people who maybe intended to give or maybe it slipped their minds, or maybe they got busy and they didn’t make their contribution in 2022,” he said.
“We want them to know it’s not too late. You can still make a difference.”
Donations can be made a www.uwaytbay.ca/donate.
