WELLINGTON COUNTY – A new program will offer assistance to individuals who may be in danger, without having to go to the police station.
Victim Services Wellington has partnered with the Loblaws chain (Zehrs, Shoppers Drug Mart, Your Independent Grocer, No Frills) to provide crisis support for victims of gender-based violence.
Elizabeth Kent, Executive Director of Victim Services Wellington, says the program gives victims a discrete way to ask for assistance when at a Loblaws location, where staff have been trained on what to do if someone asks for Angela.
She says Victim Services will then provide a needs assessment to determine what the individual requires.
Ask for Angela first came to Canada in the form of a year-long pilot project that Loblaws launched in Toronto and Kent says it spread to other locations following its success.
The biggest takeaway accord to Kent, is this provides victims an option to get help that doesn’t require going to a police station. She says this is a win for victims.
The initiative marks the local adaptation of the highly successful Ask for Angela campaign, originally established in the United Kingdom in 2016.
