Dear Brothers and Sisters,

Further to the communication sent out on March 16, things are changing on a daily basis regarding CoVid-19.

The ONRC meeting scheduled April 17/18 is being postponed until a later date. If you booked your hotel, please call The Inn of Waterloo, Tel: 1-866-875-6410 or 1-519-804-1130 to cancel your room booking.

Our number one priority is the safety of our members, staff, volunteers, and people we serve. We ask Council/Conference Presidents to give direction to their members on what they should or should not be doing in their local communities. Please be socially responsible. We encourage you to cancel all in-person meetings for the time being, and look at alternative ways to have your meetings such as Skype, Teams, Conference Call, email, etc. – be creative.

Regarding home visits and food bank operations, apply precaution and prevention in handling requests for assistance from our neighbours in need. Some alternative ways in helping may include:

• A phone chat may be the only thing needed when the person calls for assistance.
• If a visit is needed, make alternative arrangements – do not go into the home, but arrange to leave the food/voucher/food card outside the door or meet the person outside and keep your distance (more like a grocery delivery) to provide them with what is needed and avoid personal contact.
• Only have members who are comfortable going out on visits; since older people are more vulnerable, discourage older members from venturing out.
• Food bank operations need to assess what they are able to do given the circumstances.

We want to hear from you on your creative alternative ways of helping our neighbours in need during this challenging time. Please post your alternative suggestion on our Facebook post.

Regarding our SSVP stores, there has been great communication from store managers on the peer to peer site sharing what they are doing in their local community. Please do what is needed in your community, and continue the great communication on peer to peer.

We pray for everyone affected by this situation. God Bless.

Linda Dollard
President