Perth Huron United Way has relaunched its Urgent Need program.
Executive Director, Ryan Erb, says the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted people who have never before had to deal with the challenges they're facing now. Erb says they've heard of people who have been operating businesses for a long time and suddenly couldn't operate it in the same way anymore.
Erb says people experiencing that vulnerability for the first time are reluctant to ask for help and usually don't know where to find it when they are ready to ask.
Erb says they launched the Urgent Need program three weeks after the pandemic started to enable people who had immediate expenses.
"The United Way has relaunched its Individual Urgent Need program, enabling people who had immediate expenses and were challenged with finding a funding source, so if they were looking to pay for medication or groceries or if they needed a bit of money to pay someone to transport something to them, those kinds of things."
Erb says the fund has been used by well over 700 people during the pandemic and they're in a position to relaunch the program because this year's campaign was so successful. Erb says anyone needing help can call 211 and they will be directed to the specific help they need, including the Urgent Need program, or they can go directly to the Perth Huron United Way web site.