Workers at the closing Salvation Army Thrift store on Walker Rd. are trying to plan their next steps.
A closed-door meeting between workers and their union was held Tuesday night at the Windsor Sportsmen Club on Dougall Ave.
"We're an older workforce most of us, in our 50s or better, so we're all wondering what we're going to do," says Ed Eves, a union stewart and employee at the closing thrift store.
The Salvation Army decided to close the store because it's no longer financially viable.
Eves says it was hard news to hear.
"We all kind of looked at each other, it was the morning staff that was in first that heard about it, and we all just kind of looked at each other. Of course there were tears, because of the uncertainty," he says.
It's a closed door meeting right now between Salvation Army Thrift Store workers and their union #cklw pic.twitter.com/GFXak3lgWo
— Ricardo Veneza (@RicardoVeneza) August 21, 2018
The move prompted union business agent Ted Mansell to call for people to stop donating to the charity's annual red kettle campaign held over the holiday season leading up to Christmas.
Eves isn't backing away from the union's stance painting the charity as "not acting very Christian."
"I'll tell ya if you are a Christian organization I can't believe that you would just do what you did," says Eves. "Their motive is passion and compassion for the community. Are we not part of this community. We work for you. Where's the passion and compassion for us? Give us severance pay and say, 'Thank you for coming. It was nice knowing you. Goodbye.'"
He says many of the workers are lost after the shock announcement.
"We have a lot of people that don't know where they're going to go from here. We have mortgages, we have bills, we have families," says Eves. "It's not only me frustrated. For a better word to say — mad. 'Mad' is a good word to say because we had no idea that this store was going to be closed."
The store closure will see 22 people out of a job.
— with files from AM800's Teresinha Medeiros