Nov 9, 2013 / 13:20 pm
With his home heating fuel tank empty and the unseasonably mild temperatures waning at the end of October, Leo Tremblay resorted to covering himself with blankets during the day, and sleeping in layers of clothing at night in order to keep warm in the drafty trailer that has served as his home since 1976.
When even the layers of blankets could not stop him from shivering as the mercury dropped, he visited the diocese's Project Hope office in Pawtucket to apply for fuel assistance through the diocese's "Keep the Heat On" program.
"I was crying, I didn't know what to do," Tremblay said in his home last week following the delivery of 100 gallons of kerosene, provided through the program.
With overnight temperatures dipping below the freezing point, Bishop Thomas J. Tobin last week authorized a $50,000 donation from the Catholic Charity Appeal – which provides critical financial support to a number of ministries and programs that work to meet the spiritual, educational and social needs of more than 200,000 Rhode Islanders – to "Keep the Heat On" to begin providing immediate assistance to those in need.