“The Grateful Hearts program helped out a lot. It helped us get groceries. During the holiday season, money is always tight, and this helped me and my family. Receiving gift cards made me feel better than someone else buying stuff for me. It allowed me to buy gifts for my own family.”
Family supported through Hamilton Children’s Aid Society’s Grateful Hearts program
This year, we revised the holiday program and launched Grateful Hearts – a program that reflects the diversity of our community, and has been made available to support all families, no matter how they celebrate. At Hamilton CAS, we are committed to equitable outcomes for the children, youth, and families we serve and serve families of diverse faiths and traditions. Funds raised were used to provide cards to families to empower them to make their own purchases based on their own needs.
We are so excited to share feedback from the program and from families. The Grateful Hearts program:
- Empowered 293 families to make their own purchases for the holidays
- Provided families with $35,750 in PC and Giant Tiger gift cards
- Supported 450 adults and 724 children, supporting a total of 1,174 individuals
There is no better measure than direct feedback from the families we support. Another family shares, “The Grateful Hearts program helped with getting a few things that I wouldn’t normally be able to buy. We were able to buy a good quality ham for our Christmas dinner, one with a bone, which is something we cannot usually buy. I enjoyed the gift cards because I could purchase what my family needed, and I was able to buy what I knew my kids would use and enjoy.”
A heartfelt thank you to all our donors who made this program possible! Your generosity is appreciated by the children, youth and families that we serve.
We look forward to continuing to expand this program to support families celebrating various holidays throughout the year.
