Bradford's 'Great Canadian Gift Box' working to help the homeless this holiday season

A group of volunteers in the Bradford area are working to make sure none of Simcoe County's homeless are forgotten about this holiday season.

The Great Canadian Gift Box is a local charitable effort started back in 2018 to provide essentials for the less fortunate. With the rising cost of living, the group works to help those struggling to make ends meet.

"It's not only the homeless that are on the street, but I mentioned the invisible homeless, which are people that are couch surfing, they are living month to month not sure if they can make rent the next month and are about to be evicted," says Jenny DiPietro, one of the founding members. "So it's not just the people you see on the street; there's a whole other group of people who are often left out."

On Sunday, DiPietro enlisted the help of some of her son's baseball teammates to help package nearly 200 gift bags for the homeless.

"Through our endeavours, we've been able to gather community donations, so we've gotten 1000 pairs of socks, we have people giving us bulk donations of sanitary napkins; dentists from the area have given us toothbrushes and toothpaste, and all of these things need to be put in bags and wrapped nicely for gifts for the homeless," DiPietro tells CTV News.

The group hopes to grow in size and get a registered charity number by the summer, enabling them to work more closely with local schools.

If you'd like more information on the initiative, you can email [e-mail] or find them on social media.