HISTORY

A short history of Centraide

In Quebec, the Centraide movement was born in Montréal in 1917 from a group of many charity organizations that sought to limit the number of fundraising campaigns. As for Centraide Richelieu-Yamaska, it was founded in 1956 under the name Caritas. It’s on September 9th, 1975 that it was finally named Centraide Richelieu-Yamaska.

The United Way/Centraide movement

All of Quebec’s regions are served by branches of Centraide, which are autonomous and managed by independent boards of directors that represent their community. Each of them collects donations and invests in its community to break the cycle of poverty and social exclusion. Centraide invests with the constant concern of having the biggest possible impact. They support more than 1500 partner agencies and community projects to improve more than 1.5 million lives locally. Quebec’s Centraide branches are also members of Centraide Canada which brings together almost 100 Centraide and United Way branches across the country.

4 areas of action guide the Centraide branches in Quebec:

  • Support youth success;
  • Take care of the essentials;
  • Break social isolation;
  • At the end of the day, it’s the whole community that benefits from it.