Time to don your warmest winter woolies, Crossenvale Community House is running a winter sleep out to support homelessness.
Crossenvale Community House co-ordinator Sheridan Clark said the August 5 event had so far had a lot of interest from both participants and sponsors.
“Moama Bowling Club will provide the soup and the buns, which is great, and the Moama Football Club as well will be helping out with some activities for the kids,” Ms Clark said.
“Bunnings has donated some stuff for the kids to have an activity table, so we have quite a lot of sponsors, which is great, a lot of people have put their hands up to sponsor it.
“We’ll also have our coffee van over there as well that will be running all night to either keep people napping or awake if they want to.
“We’ve had some VISY cardboard donated to us, so we’ll have some activities on the night and some prizes to give out to keep us entertained.”
While there will be many fun activities for participants to be involved in, Ms Clark said the evening was designed to spark conversations about homelessness in our community.
“People will get the experience of what it is like to be sleeping rough,” she said.
“(Participants are) not getting any special treatment on the night — they’ll be getting a soup kitchen meal, and a homeless pack with a drink of water and a muesli bar, and they’ll be able to bring their swag or make themselves a cardboard box.
“Murray River Council has been great allowing us to use their new sports complex, so people can either find a spot near the kitchens or go up into the seating area, or on the netball courts, there’s not a limited space where they can set up.
“We have a couple of people who have said they will be sleeping in their cars, because there are a lot of people locally who do that, especially around Echuca. I know someone is going to bring their kids and sleep in the car and have that conversation with the kids about how it happens to some families in our area, and Australia wide.”
The sleep out will go towards fighting homelessness in our communities, with funds raised supporting Crossenvale Community House, Anglicare Victoria and Teen Challenge in Kyabram.
“All the money raised stays locally,” Ms Clark said.
“I’ve worked in homelessness before, and I know how hard it is to get money to people with the restrictions on spending funds on clients, and sometimes you do have issues where you can’t buy them something.
“The money that will be donated to Anglicare Victoria will be for the housing team either to help people to get crisis accommodation or things to help them while they’re in crisis accommodation.
“I love Teen Challenge — I love their purpose, and their outcomes, and what they’re doing over there, so that’s why I chose them.
“You can be homeless, but there’s the journey after being homeless, and I think sometimes a lot of people need programs like Teen Challenge to help them on the way and to keep them out of homelessness as well.”
Ms Clark said Crossenvale Community House had seen at least a 50 per cent increase in the number of people accessing the house’s food bank, largely due to the ongoing rental crisis.
“I think everyone is seeing it’s not just “homeless people”, it’s also working families who are having issues because of the rental crisis,” she said.
“Sometimes we have people say ‘I’ve just lost my job’, a few people who are accessing it are living in hotels, and I know a couple of people who are working, who have just had their rental lease end and get kicked out, and they had to go into a hotel until they could find a place.
“If anyone out there is struggling, they can come and access our house — we’ve had people come over from Cohuna to access the food bank — we’re willing to help anyone who needs it.”
The Crossenvale Community House Winter Sleep Out will begin on Friday, August 5 at 4.30pm and finish on Saturday, August 6 at 9am at Moama Football Ground, Kirchhofer St, Moama. Registration is $30 per person (under-18 free).
To sign up for the winter sleep out, visit www.eventbrite.com.au/e/echuca-moama-sleepout-tickets-338587282677 or to donate to the fundraising campaign, visit www.givenow.com.au/em-sleepout-2022
For more information please visit the House’s facebook page at www.facebook.com/CrossenvaleCommunityHouse or contact the team on crossenvale@gmail.com