A fundraising campaign intended to step-up efforts to find a young woman who disappeared from Victoria two years ago is in danger of falling far short of its goal.

The Help Find Emma Fillipoff Indiegogo page had raised just two per cent of its $75,000 goal as of late Sunday afternoon, with a little more than two days left to go in the campaign.

According to Emma’s mother, Shelley Fillipoff, the funds raised were meant to pay for a private investigator and possibly increase the value of a $25,000 reward for information leading to the young woman’s whereabouts.

“We have fallen so short of our goal,” Fillipoff said. “It’s not nearly enough.”

Emma, 28, was last seen outside the Empress Hotel in Victoria on Nov. 28, 2012, when someone called 911 to report a woman in distress. Police spoke with her at length and determined that she wasn’t a risk to herself or others before letting her go, according to Fillipoff.

Her mother travelled to Vancouver for two weeks last month to look into the possibility that Emma was living somewhere on the city’s east side.

“I had a lot of tips come in. I had a lot of people saying that she looked familiar, but we weren’t able to narrow it down,” Fillipoff said, acknowledging that it would be easy to stay hidden in a city the size of Vancouver.

“To be honest, I have absolutely no idea where she is.”

She still hopes to hire a private investigator, if only to rule out one of several possible scenarios that include a fatal accident, suicide and even murder.

Fillipoff is hopeful that an upcoming episode of CBC’s The Fifth Estate that focuses on Emma’s disappearance could get her daughter’s story back in the public eye.

Emma last spoke to her mother during a phone conversation just days before she disappeared. The younger woman sounded distraught and Fillipoff flew out to Victoria to offer help, but Emma was already gone.

blindsay@vancouversun.com