Well-known Wexford charity permanently closes down

A well-known Wexford charity will permanently close down as of tonight…

Wexford People Helping People took to social media on Monday evening to share the news that their charity will no longer be in operation as of Monday night, 6th May.

The news will come as a big blow to the service users in Wexford town, and specifically, for high-risk users.

The lengthy statement, which highlights their reasons for closing such as their lack of funding and lack of support from Wexford County Council, reads as follows:

“Our crew have been in talks over the weekend – we met officially this evening. We have public announcement to make that affects everyone who supports or benefits from Wexford People Helping People.

We took the charity over in 2024 as a new committee fired up and ready to go – huge aspirations of being able to make a real difference in our community. The previous committee made the difficult decision to step down after building the organisation up. This was decided after a prolonged attack from people set on vilifying and taking the charity down by lodging unfounded complaints to the charity regulator and other government bodies that resulted in a prolonged investigation that eventually ruled that there was no wrongdoing. After hitting burn out the founding committee decided to pass the charity to those they felt would do it justice.

With a clean slate and fresh faces – it’s new home became Red Books in Peter’s Square, Wexford Town – with new director Wally O’ Neill and his newly founded committee at the helm.

The lads have gone from strength to strength and with very little funding have managed to pay for counselling sessions, food supplies, rough sleeping equipment and alternative supplies for cases.

While we are a small unfunded body that are completely voluntary – nobody who works with or for the charity gets paid for their time – we rely solely on the kindness of our phenomenal community. We cannot thank you all enough for the support you have given us over the years.

While it has been tantamount to the work we do – it never seems to be enough to meet the current demand.
As the onslaught of attacks are continuing on the charity – affecting the physical and mental health of the current committee – we have decided to draw a line in the sand and make what has been an incredibly difficult decision to wind things down permanently. This factor alongside an increasingly difficult time due to the cost of living and housing crisis.

We were aware from the previous committee that Wexford Council were reluctant to work/support the charity on many a case – we didn’t realise the true magnitude of this until we took the reins ourselves. It’s one thing to hear about it – it’s another to experience it. We have in recent weeks been sent cases from Wexford Co.Co – they have sent people down to us seeking support. We do not turn anyone away. Our issue with this is the council would never list the charity as an out of hours service on the emergency line for rough sleepers in need of equipment.

They would never acknowledge us publicly as an outlet of support. They were never willing to work with the charity to see how we could facilitate one another – to maybe create a system that would help with the flow of service users. We have come up against many walls with Wexford Co.Co. their shortcomings are many in relation to the cases we have brought to them seeking support. We have been left incredibly frustrated at times – particularly with at risk cases that we have not been able to garner supports for.

The Gardai – while we have an excellent working relationship and the Gardai have contacted the charity on many an occasion at all hours – we have been willing to support always. The Gardai have organised food drives on our behalf and supported the best ways that they could – we have found that the council are also pawning off cases to the Garda Station and then the Gardai are having to reach out to local charities for support out of hours – this is not an issue we are happy to help but our funds are limited and while the council have set it up to be this way – they are in no way offering to refurnish finances for their failure in duty of care. One main issue we have taken into consideration with the Gardai is that we have often made calls for vulnerable cases that have gone unsupported with no follow through. We understand there is a criteria to work through but it feels that it falls short for vulnerable people that we have brought to their attention

We have supported many cases through Tusla over the years and have been left dumbfounded by how tied a social workers hands are – while they are working within the system. We have had many social workers ringing for practical support for cases – and they state that they are not really allowed to be doing “this” – but they want to do everything they can to support those they are working for. Simple things like organising beds for children.

We are realising that the system is insurmountably broken from the top down and bottom up nothing seems to work hand in hand as it should.

As the groundworkers we often reach out to the local Cllrs. Several of whom have been excellent supporters over the years – the Cllrs do not have as much clout as we would hope they have in instances where someone is left out on the street after midnight in the rain – homeless.

We feel that the councillors are lacking the ability to truly tackle social issues by having the power maintained by the civil servants that are given the title of “decision maker”. And some Cllrs simply don’t want to engage with us.

It is wholly inhumane to leave a person out on the street and not have an out of hours line that can provide guaranteed refuge not just during severe weather warnings. This is something that seriously needs to be looked at on a national level.

Due to lack of funding, the cost of living impacting everyone – donations have thinned out for stock that we desperately rely on. If we have no stock we need to purchase. If we are low on funds we cannot sustain what is required. Financially it is no longer feasible to continue.

Due to ongoing attacks on the charity from a small group of individuals – that have caused a burn out amongst volunteers and affected the mental and physical wellbeing of committee members – it is no longer feasible to continue.

We have hit a stage where our case load far exceeds the capacity we are able to facilitate. We only envision this becoming worse as the cost of living crisis intensifies. It is currently costing us out of our own pockets on many occasions to foot the bill for necessities for others.

We are also feeling the pinch in our personal lives.

It is with a heavy heart that we announce that the charity is closing its doors as of tonight. We will no longer be accepting donations of items physically or financially. We will no longer be operating our Mental Health Cafe from Red Books.

Red Books will no longer be a drop in for service users during the day. There will be no more food hampers or free teas/coffees available at Red Books

We will be speaking to our accountant tomorrow to figure out financials. Any monies left over will be given to counsellors currently maintaining the list of service users for counselling sessions. We will not be taking anymore referrals for counseling services.

We apologise for the difficulty that this is going to cause those who relied upon us. We are happy to redirect you to services that can support you if you’d like to get in touch through the page. We will be as transparent as possible in the wrapping up of the charity over the coming weeks.

Again we would like to thank all of you who supported our efforts over the years – we are truly grateful. We are sorry to see what has been built from the ground up – go. But after a discussion between the current and previous committee this evening a joint decision was made to close the doors. We will not be passing the charity over to anyone else. It officially closes it’s doors today.

Thank you for trusting us to give what we could back to our wonderful community. We hope to see you around.”

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