‘A lot of senseless, needless vandalism’
Vandals destroy toys collected by firefighters, community responds
Greg Dinney knows the community of Corner Brook comes through when help is needed.
So, it’s no surprise that within hours of sharing the news that the Corner Brook Firefighters’ Toy Drive storage facility had been vandalized and thousands of dollars worth of toys destroyed that the community started to step up to refill the shelves.
Dinney is the chair of the toy drive. He told SaltWire the vandalism was reported to him on Oct. 30 and is believed to have occurred the previous weekend. He said individuals were seen leaving the building and the security company for the site contacted the owners of the building. Once the damage was discovered, the owners of the property contacted Dinney and the incident was reported to police.
He said there was between $6,000 and $8,000 worth of toys stored at the location, and between $3,000 and $4,000 worth was destroyed.
Seeing the “senseless damage,” especially knowing all the hard work that is put into the toy drive by the firefighters, was disheartening, he said.
“I thought before possibly we could get robbed, but I never thought people would come in and just destroy the place. Because it wasn’t just the toys that were destroyed, it was the building itself. A lot of senseless, needless vandalism.”
Last year, the initiative provided toys to about 150 families for an estimated 250 children.
Dinney said while they were able to salvage about $3,000 to $4,000 worth of toys, the loss will set the firefighters back as they get ready for this year.
“It’s all our stock from last year. Over the past few years, we’ve been building (a stockpile of) more toys, so this is all the toys we had left over from last year.”
With a reduced stockpile, he said, they are without the buffer of toys they would have had to start off this year’s drive.
That’s why he went public with the news of the vandalism on Bay FM earlier this month.
“Normally we wait till a little bit later, until we need a push,” he said.
But with a lot to make up, he said the toy drive needs help from the community now.
“The community always responds well. Any time we asked before in the past, it always responded well.”
Bay FM posted about the loss on Facebook and said it was “time to come together as a community again.” That post has been shared many times and caught the attention of some other local businesses.
After learning of the loss, Nissan Corner Brook posted on its Facebook page that it would donate $1,000 to the toy drive and challenged other vehicle dealers to pitch in.
Humber Ford jumped on board to say it “couldn’t be happier to donate to this cause.”
A post on the company’s Facebook page said, “To think of children waking up on Christmas with nothing to unwrap is completely unacceptable and, frankly, heartbreaking to us. We cannot, and will not, let the magic of Christmas be destroyed by criminals.”
Taylor Smiles, owned by local orthodontist Bill Taylor, posted a contest to encourage people to donate. Anyone who donates a toy or money to the toy drive at the clinic will be entered into a draw to win a gift card tree worth $400.
The toy drive should also receive a much-needed boost when the annual Beary Merry Christmas Concert takes place at the Corner Brook Arts and Culture Centre on Nov. 27.
Dinney said the toy drive committee also has a few ideas in the preliminary stages of things it may do to restock the shelves, including a possible popup toy drop at the fire station.
This story previously ran in The Telegram.