The Northern Refugee Sponsorship Committee had its first public meeting on Thursday evening.  The group introduced their project’s objectives of bringing in up to two refugee families to our community.  Committee head Laura Sparling appreciates the enthusiasm that is being shown for this project.  She says there were between 60 to 80 people in attendance with a lot of enthusiastic questions from the crowd, the whole plan went over well with the crowd and everybody seemed pretty positive and motivated in whatever way they’re able to support it.             

The meeting featured a skype uplink with Arisnel Mesidor from Hamilton the Mennonite Central Committee who the group will be working with as they have experience and government authority to bring refugees to Canada.  The NRSC has members that will focus on housing, community outreach, fundraising, bookkeeping and English language training. The goal is to have the refugees here by March of 2016 at the latest.  Even with the federal government mandate the refugees could be, but may not necessarily be from Syria.  Anyone with questions or looking to help can visit Northern Refugee Sponsorship Committee on Facebook.