Mississauga Library Workers and CUPE Local 966 Helping Their Community
The library project to help the Moose Deer Point First Nation Reserve began in January 2012 when CUPE 966 heard that the reserve had no school and no library. Children were being bussed to neighbouring communities to attend school and many were dropping out at a very early age due to the inconvenience of travel and the lack of resources near home to complete school assignments. CUPE 966 took on the challenge of building them a library in their own community. The local purchased and built the wall of shelves you see in the pictures.
Since then the local has been gathering donations of new or gently used books for the library.
On Saturday July 22nd, CUPE 966 took their pink bus on a trip up to the reserve to deliver books.
Sheryl, from the Moose Deer Point Education Committee, was extremely grateful and very emotional when she saw the amount of new books we delivered. She actually cried with joy. She was overwhelmed by the generosity of the various donors and organizations that helped make this possible.
Thanks to all our CUPE 966 members and members of all CUPE Locals in Peel who donated books. Thanks too to the Mississauga Library System and the Mississauga Friends of the Library who donated gently used books. We owe a special thanks to First Book Canada for setting us up with 56 boxes of brand spanking new donations.
Now thanks to everyone’s generosity, we have only one problem. The shelves in the little library are overflowing and there are still books to be shelved. They will need more shelves! Stay tuned for Moose Deer Point First Nation Library Project, Part 2…
Submitted by Hayley Thomas, Unit Chair, Mississauga Library Workers, CUPE Local 966