The 44 brave souls who took part in the thirteenth annual COPE Galway Business Leaders’ Sleep Out have raised an amazing €217,091 for the local charity’s Homeless Service.

These essential funds ensure COPE Galway can continue to respond to the challenges of homelessness in Galway and allows staff to create positive projects that directly benefit their clients.

The organisation is very grateful for the incredible generosity and kindness of the 44 participants and their supporters – because their efforts will make a real difference.

“The homelessness crisis is not letting up unfortunately,” said Sinead Carey, COPE Galway’s Head of Homeless Service.

“This is most starkly illustrated by our accommodation services being consistently full and a more than doubling of the numbers of people availing of our day centre and outreach services. We are providing approximately 50 people with food and other essential supports daily,” she added.

The aim of the annual Sleep-Out is to draw attention to the issue of homelessness in Galway, to generate an understanding of what it is to sleep out on the streets in winter and to raise essential funds to make sure the charity can continue to respond to these challenges and offer vital supports for people who find themselves affected by homelessness.

Sharon Fitzpatrick, Head of Development at COPE Galway, commended the Galway Business Leaders who have taken on the challenge.

“Without doubt, we are stronger when we work together and the COPE Galway Business Leaders’ Sleep Out is a great example of this,” she said.

Pictured at a recent event at Platform94  to announce the total raised are some of the 2024 participants of the COPE Galway Business Leaders’ Sleep Out (back – from left) Jarlath Feeney (IFN Group), Emagen Moloi (Forvis Mazars), Eoghan McGuire (DHKN), Justin Molloy (Construction Industry Federation), Helen Keane (Bank of Ireland), Maciej Dabrowski (Genesys), with (front) Padraic Hession (PHE Engineering and Architecture), Shane Mooney (SPeco.ie Sustainability Consultancy), Cian Begley (AIB), Mike Stratford (Thermo King), Declan Slemon (Aerogen), Trevor Gardiner (Bank of Ireland), and Pamela Wynne (DHKN).