Community comes together to support residents displaced by Shediac apartment fire - CBC

One of three rooms inside Hôtel Shediac where donations were piled up after a fire consumed a 36-unit apartment complex the previous week. (Victoria Walton/CBC)Social SharingOverwhelming. That’s how volunteers and displaced residents describe walking into the suite at Hôtel Shediac that’s currently piled wall-to-wall with bags of donations.

“In 12 hours, 200 bags arrived, and they just kept coming,” said Barb Reisler, who’s been volunteering since Friday, the day after the fire.

The donations have all been brought by the community, to give to the victims of a disastrous apartment building fire that took place in Shediac in the early morning hours of Oct. 29.

The entire 36-unit building was lost, leaving an estimated 70 people without access to their belongings and without a place to stay.

Fire crews said the 36-unit apartment building at 25 Cornwall Rd. in Shediac was a complete loss after a fire on Oct. 29. (Victoria Walton/CBC)

Reisler said she saw a call out for volunteers on social media and wanted to help because the same thing happened to her nearly 40 years ago.

“I know the fear; I know what it's like,” she said. “So I had to come and help.”

Over the past five days, Reisler and about 15 other volunteers have been taking turns folding clothes, sorting them by size and gender, carefully lining up shoes, and organizing linens for displaced residents to help themselves to.

“We help them to choose stuff, tell them what they can take,” said Lillian LeBlanc, another volunteer helping with hotel donations. “Some of them are shy, they'll just take one little toothpaste and it's like, 'No, take what you need.'”

A sign in the lobby of Hôtel Shediac telling residents to stop bringing donations. (Victoria Walton/CBC)

By Monday morning, there was a sign in the hotel lobby, telling residents that they were no longer accepting clothing donations — there were just too many.

“We had no more room to pile, the piles of bags were actually probably seven feet high,” said Reisler.

The local Lions Club also brought $800 worth of toiletries.

“We donated some soaps, shampoos, conditioners, body wash. We donated enough items for the full 36 dwellings,” said Humphrey-Lewisville-Sunny Brae Lions Club president Maurice Boucher.

While clothing donations will be refused, volunteers are still accepting things like toothbrushes, deodorant and diapers.

“We put a call out for hair dryers. We got those right away. Toilet paper, [too],” said Reisler.

Reisler, second from right, said that there have been more than a dozen volunteers helping sort donations. (Victoria Walton/CBC)

Some of the donations have shown up with perfect timing.

“Yesterday, this lady was looking for wipes, and I swear three minutes after, this guy came in with a big box and there were wipes in there,” said LeBlanc. “You can see the people, that when they leave after they found stuff for themselves, they're smiling. So it's very rewarding.”

The victims of the fire can come to look through the donations any time they want, as many times as they want. The volunteers aren’t asking for identification to respect people’s privacy, but many victims have been sharing their stories.

“This is my third visit here and it's wonderful,” said Edith Meier, one of the displaced residents who was picking up some items on Tuesday morning. “I mean, half of it's brand new stuff. Come on down, you know, get coats and everything.” 

Edith Meier browses through donations to help her through the process after losing her new apartment in a fire on Oct. 29. (Victoria Walton/CBC)

Meier had only moved in the building the day before it burnt down and said she didn’t believe it when she was woken up at 4 a.m. to the sound of alarms and sirens.

“It sounded like a fire truck was coming through my apartment,” she said.

Meier, who moved from Moncton to Shediac, said it’s been a great first impression of the town she’s making her home.

“My eyes just lit up. I said, 'Wow, the community really pulls together here in Shediac,'” she said. “I mean, everyone's coming together. No one has to be out on the street. No one.”

Shediac, which has a population of under 8,000, according to the last census, is a close-knit community.

So it wasn’t just clothing donations that poured in after the fire. Displaced residents also were welcomed into local restaurants for free food.

“We're still eating for free,” said Meier.

The businesses offering support include Le Globe Café, which brought coffee and croissants on the first morning, La Coast Restaurant, which has offered free breakfast every morning since the fire, and even chain restaurants like A&W, St. Louis Bar & Grill, and Pita Pit offering free meals.

Sarap, a small Filipino restaurant in Shediac that opened in 2023, offered free hot meals to all residents on the first day, and beyond for those who still need it.

“It's very sad for the community. So I just said that, OK, I'm going to offer food for free,” said owner Melody Landry.

Sarap is one of several Shediac businesses that offered free meals to victims of the fire. (Katelin Belliveau/CBC)

Landry said she also gave a gift card to Sarap’s adjacent Filipino grocery store and a bag of rice to some residents in need, including other Filipino families.

For her, giving back to the community that has made her restaurant a success is crucial.

“Sarap is where I'm at right now because of the community,” Landry said. “Because of community, we survive. So I thought … who am I [if] I'm not going to share my blessings.”

Hôtel Shediac has been giving free space to hold all the donations but has told the volunteers they can only do so for so long.

“On Friday we're going to start a sale. So it's going to be, all the proceeds will go back to the residents either by cash or by gift card,” said Reisler.

The plan is to sell off all the donations on Friday and Saturday and fully vacate the hotel room on Sunday.

Volunteers say that clothing items not taken by residents will be sold later in the week for either $1 an item or $5 per bag or winter coat. (Victoria Walton/CBC)

While the donation room will be cleaned up soon, the connections made between Shediac residents will continue on.

“There's about 16, 18 volunteers that have been in and out since Friday, and I only knew one of them beforehand,” Reisler said. “Now we're all kind of like a little family.”

She said she’s not surprised at all by the amount of donations that showed up.

“Shediac kind of comes out for each other and … it's a true statement of the town,” Reisler said.

Victoria Walton is a reporter at CBC New Brunswick, and previously worked with CBC P.E.I. She is originally from Nova Scotia, and has a bachelor of journalism from the University of King's College. You can reach her at victoria.walton@cbc.ca.