By Tom Mark

New Street Outreach For Vernon Women Begins Tonight

Oct 6, 2017 | 6:13 AM

Hope Outreach will begin its first walk in Vernon’s downtown this weekend after a successful organizing campaign for outreach workers.

The program aims to help Vernon’s homeless, addicted or exploited women on the streets on weekend nights when there is no outreach help for them.

Founder Angie Lohr says 25 volunteers signed up and she will run shadowing shifts for them each weekend this month.

The Vernon team will then continue on their own after that.

“There’s going to be more care out on the street level at night time for them and mostly the exploited women. I even saw that when came in on
Sunday. We held it at the People Place and I probably went past six women who were in exploitation”

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She says it was sad to see on a Sunday afternoon

The outreach team will be out between 7 pm and 8:30 pm Friday through Sunday every weekend.

The plan is to begin around the Upper Room Mission.

“And then we’ll be walking up to the Salvation Army House of Hope and then walking around the Safeway area and a couple of parking lots down by the auction there and then just coming up again to the Mission.”

Lohr says some of the volunteers already have some social service experience.

They and others joined because of the need to help women on the streets.

She’s been able get some businesses on board with donations as well as a local dentist providing some dental supplies, but more donations are needed to give the women some essentials.

“Like used shampoos and cream rinses and so forth, feminine products, slightly used makeup, winter coats, mitts, hats that we take out in the winter time.”

Anyone who can donate can contact Hope Outreach at www.hope-outreach.com or call Angie at 1-250 864 – 0399.

Angie says as interest grows, she hopes to hold an orientation meeting once per month with the end goal of being able to have members out on the street week nights as well.

by Tom Mark