The Downtown Mission’s Bench Talks Event 2024
A message from Rukshini Ponniah-Goulin, Exectutive Director, Downtown Mission of Windsor:
I’d like to take this opportunity to invite you to join us during this year’s Event to show your support of the work we do at the Mission and your support of the people we serve here at the Mission every day/night. I will be out there again, in front of the DTM (875 Ouellette) for 24 hours with my fellow Bench Talkers – Abram Banman (DTM Board Member), Natalie Bourgoin and Greg Lemay (Community Advocates) and Councillor Renaldo Agostino (Ward 3 City Councillor). We’ll be out there getting a small idea of what it feels like to be outside for the night and not having a warm/safe bed of our own to enjoy in the privacy of our home, much like 100+ individuals at the Mission go through every night and countless others experience nightly who don’t stay in any of our shelters.
Please consider joining us if you’re able to for any length of time between 11 am Thursday, Oct. 3rd and 11 am Friday, Oct. 4th and please feel free to invite your Team Members to join you or to come in your place if you’re unable to do so. If you’d like to come by on your own or with members of your Team, please do sign up for a spot during the 24 hours where the Bench Talkers can devote our time to you and take you on a tour of the Mission as well if you would like to see what updates we’ve made to our space as of late to keep up with the needs of the Guests we serve and our Community at large as well – https://bit.ly/BenchTalks2024 (if you would like a full tour, please book 2 back-to-back slots at least so we can give you a full tour which would take around 45 mins and allow time for questions as well along the way). If you prefer not to use the Calendly tool to book your spot(s), please feel free to email either myself or my colleague, Harsh (harsh@downtownmission.com) to do so and we’d be happy to.
If you are able and would like to, please do consider joining our Fundraising Efforts through this Event by making your own Fundraising Page (for yourself or your Company/Organization/Team) and inviting your Friends/Family/Neighbours/etc to support you as you strive to help the work we do at the Mission every day possible – http://weblink.donorperfect.com/DowntownMission/2024BenchTalks
If you can’t make it but would like to support our Event and our work through it, please consider making a donation, of any size, through this secure link and you will receive a Donation Tax Receipt shortly thereafter emailed to you from our Fundraising Platform, Donor Perfect.
Proceeds from this year’s Bench Talks Event will help fund operations of our Food Bank which is currently providing food to 1,500 individuals or 750 households on average per month. It is open from 10 am – 2:30 pm Tuesday through Friday and is fully funded through Donations, so every little bit helps! We’d appreciate your help spreading the word as well. Our Community Members are the ones making this food service available to those facing food insecurity possible, providing hope to individuals and families who are hurting in our community, ALL of us at the Mission thank YOU!!!
God bless and have a great evening!
We hope to see YOU at Bench Talks 2024 🙂
Rukshini Ponniah-Goulin
Executive Director
Downtown Mission of Windsor
