Cranbrook’s Home Depot has once again gone above and beyond with their Orange Door fundraising campaign, raising over $9,400 for the Ktunaxa Nation’s Street Angel program — with that amount getting doubled by The Home Depot Canada Foundation, matching the local location’s target for a total of more than $18,000.
READ MORE: Home Depot’s Orange Door campaign raises $24,274 for Street Angel
Home Depot runs the Orange Door campaign twice a year, once in the summer and again just before Christmas, with the focus of the program set on ridding communities of youth homelessness. The company allows the individual stores to partner with various charitable organizations that have that same focus as their mandate.
“In Cranbrook we don’t necessarily have a home where youth can go and stay and that sort of thing, like some larger communities do,” said Tim Strauss, Cranbrook Home Depot manager. “But probably the closest thing that we have is Street Angels here in town, who works with youth that are in the street and trying to provide them with a good meal every day, some clothes, a place to shower, do laundry — whatever it might be.”
READ MORE: Home Depot’s 2016 Orange Door Campaign
As they are the organization here in town with the closes objective to what the national campaign focuses on, Cranbrook Home Depot has partnered with Street Angel for five years now, raising over $160,000 in that time.
“We are fortunate to live in a community with businesses like Home Depot that truly care about the homelessness issue in our area, they have been great partners in this fundraising effort,” said Tammy Pocha, Ktunaxa Nation Council Social On-Site Supervisor – Street Angel and Scotty’s House.
“Last year, The Orange Door Project raised over $36,000 for Street Angel at the Cranbrook Home Depot location. This speaks volumes to the generosity of the people who live in and around Cranbrook and especially the dedication of the Cranbrook Home Depot employees who helped us in this campaign.”
Cranbrook Home Depot had the highest percentage in the country for selling orange doors per customer transaction, according to Strauss. When customers come in they can purchase an orange door; an additional two dollars on top of whatever they’re purchasing. 100 per cent of those funds are donated to Street Angels.
“When we are doing some fundraising things here in our store, in addition to customers going through the tills and purchasing doors Street Angels is literally willing to come in with some volunteers to assist us here in the store or in our parking lot or with some community event to help fundraise for the Orange Door project,” Strauss said. “So it’s not just us doing the work, they’re literally coming and supporting the cause as well — it’s a great partnership that we have between them.”
Strauss added that every year they do the campaign, the store has a large amount of people who come through and are already familiar with Street Angel and the work they do in the community, and are willing to get behind them to support them.
Operation Street Angel is run by the Ktunaxa Nation and provides services to homeless and vulnerable populations within the Cranbrook area, through hot, nutritious meals, mental health and nurse practitioner services, advocacy, employment and justice services. They are located at 46 17th Ave. S.
You can learn more about the Orange Door Project at www.homedepot.ca/foundation
paul.rodgers@cranbrooktownsman.com
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