“Two dining room tables, a sofa, 22 chairs, a bed, a desk, oh, and another bed…”
Suzi Shore Sauvé is taking an informal inventory, not of a furniture store, but of her own garage.
An active volunteer in the Jewish community, she initiated a grassroots project to provide refugees newly settled in Ottawa with basic furnishings for their new home.
Collecting food or clothing for newcomers from strife-ridden countries is commonplace; yet Shore Sauvé was appalled to discover these people, who come with nothing, often spend weeks or more in empty dwellings.
“They may have a pillow or a blanket, and are sleeping on the floor,” she said.
She looks for donations of furniture, has the items picked up and delivered—or stored—and matches them to refugee families as quickly as possible.
Since she launched the project in the late summer of 2020, Shore Sauvé figures she has provided close to 150 families with furnishings. “I don’t keep track anymore,” she said.
It all started when she was approached to help out certain refugees. “From there, I went down a rabbit hole,” she said, and hasn’t looked back.
The recent influx of Afghani refugees has given her work fresh impetus.
Handling bulky furniture poses far greater logistical challenges than food or clothing, even more so during a pandemic, but Shore Sauvé was undaunted.
She has furnished whole apartments or houses, or supplied specific wares, such as for the kitchen, as needed. She was shocked that some people didn’t even have utensils.
“People say they would like to bring them meals, and I ask, ‘Are you sure they have a fork’?”
In addition to her own two-car garage, Shore Sauvé filled her parents’ garage and that of her partner in this volunteer venture, Omnia el-Mohtasseb, who immigrated from Egypt a few years ago.
When Shore Sauvé set out, the majority of refugees were from Syria or other Arabic-speaking countries, as well as a few from Congo. In Mohtasseb she found someone who could help with communication.
Still, these garages were not enough to hold everything, and Shore Sauvé rented a large storage unit—at her own expense.
On the day she spoke with The CJN, she was elated because she was about to take possession of a 10,400-square-foot space, a former grocery store, loaned for an indefinite period by Brigil Construction, a real estate developer.
Everything stored will be moved in there. For the first time in more than a year, she and her husband will be able to park their vehicles in the garage.
At the beginning, Shore Sauvé asked friends and acquaintances if they had furniture they would like to get rid of. She started scouring selling sites on the internet and eventually created her own Facebook page, From House to Home.
“If I find someone asking $25 for something, I ask if they would like to give it away to people in need. I’m a little ballsy; the worst they could say is no,” she said.
Many do agree, but often they then want the article gone immediately. Shore Sauvé has to scramble to find a truck and a mover—again an expense she, in most cases, has absorbed, defrayed only by modest fundraising efforts.
Timing the delivery to the recipients can also be tricky because when they move into their home may be uncertain. “A lot of things we have no control over; it’s a balancing act,” she said.
As much as possible, she gives recipients a choice of furniture items.
Members of the Jewish community have been generous, and Shore Sauvé is pleased with how the project has forged relations with the Muslim community.
She noted that it was a Chabad rabbi, Chaim Boyarsky, who brought to her attention the plight of an Afghan woman, a doctor, here alone and pregnant. Her tiny apartment was kitted out quickly and she was thrilled.
Shore Sauvé prides herself on the efficiency of her operation. There are charitable organizations that supply furniture to refugees, but the process may take weeks or even months, she said.
“We are able to turn around more quickly because we bypass the system,” she said.
Even though the project has grown beyond what she ever expected, Shore Sauvé is firm that she will not formalize her project as a non-profit because she wants to stay unencumbered by the regulations and red tape that entails.
