Sudbury Salvation Army Helped More People Over Christmas

By Angela Gemmill

Christmas seems like such a long time ago, but the Salvation Army in Sudbury is just now tallying up results from its two holiday campaigns.

The long-running Kettle Campaign, which collected money at a dozen locations across the city, raised over $200,000 for year-round programming at the agency.

The Salvation Army also collected toys and food for Christmas hampers, which it provided to 972 registered households.

Sudbury’s Community Ministries Coordinator, Caroline Lewis says that’s a 30% increase over 2014, when they helped 744 households.

Many of this year’s clients were new, having never used the Salvation Army before.

Lewis feels more families needed to use the social service agency because of skyrocketing costs for hydro, food and gas.

She believes the Salvation Army was able to help so many people this year because of the generosity of other Sudbury residents, who donated to the cause (toys, frozen turkeys, hams money).

She especially wanted to thank all the volunteers who helped with the Christmas campaigns, from those who manned Salvation Army Kettles, to those who helped with toy and food drives.