April 8, 2019
Recently, CBC News reported on The Period Purse, a group that provides free menstrual products to women experiencing homelessness. The YW Kitchener-Waterloo is a recipient of these products, along with other personal items for women staying at the YW Emergency Shelter. The full article is below.
Got period products? This charity wants donations in Kitchener, Cambridge and Waterloo
The Period Purse provides women experiencing homelessness with menstrual products.
A group that provides free menstrual products to women who need them is asking people in Kitchener, Waterloo and Cambridge to make donations this month.
The Period Purse’s local chapter is doing their first Spring Blitz until April 24 and is looking for donations of period and menstrual products, large purses, bags, backpacks, totes, cloth pads and washcloths, new socks and underwear, bar soap, hats, mitts, scarves and sweet treats like chocolates and granola bars.
The donated items are packed into bags with a motivational note and then given to local shelters and help centres so that women who are experiencing homelessness have the items they need for their period.
The Period Purse’s local chapter will donate all the gathered packs to The Bridges shelter in Cambridge, St. John’s Kitchen at The Working Centre in Kitchener and the YWCA Kitchener-Waterloo.
Items can be donated at the following locations:
- The Museum in Kitchener.
- Move with Grace Dance Studios in Cambridge.
- Realign Health in Cambridge.
- Cambridge City Hall.
- Truth Beauty Company in Waterloo.
- University of Waterloo’s PAS Building.
On Friday, British Columbia’s provincial government ruled that all public schools must provide menstrual products for students in school bathrooms by the end of 2019.
The ministerial order was made by B.C. Education Minister Rob Fleming, who called it “common sense.”
