Local food banks make last push for Christmas donations

By Alejandra Pulido-Guzman - Lethbridge Herald on December 19, 2024.

LETHBRIDGE HERALDapulido@lethbridgeherald.com

With many southern Albertans struggling to have food on the table, demand at local food banks has been high during this holiday season.
As part of the Christmas Hope Campaign, the Lethbridge Food Bank and the Interfaith Food Bank have been collecting food items as well as financial donations. But increased demand has left both charities struggling and in need of help from the community. More than 500 Christmas hampers have been distributed since Dec. 9, but there is still and still almost a week to go, and more donations are desperately needed.
Denille Tizzard with the Lethbridge Food Bank says its total number of hampers last month reached 879.
“(Demand) is slowing down a little bit,” she says. “But we’re still doing about 100 hampers today (Thursday), so we’re likely going to reach that 500 mark if not more this week. We originally thought we would do around 1,000 hampers, but we’re now anticipating higher numbers, so we have a lot of need,”
 Hampers will be delivered until Dec. 23.
She said their last day for Christmas hampers distribution will be on Dec. 23 and they are anticipating they will be distributing more hampers than originally anticipated.
 Tizzard says monetary donations are always appreciated as they allow the bank to buy specific items that may be needed at certain times. Right now, though, demand is especially high for Christmas items, specifically turkeys, which are in short supply. The banks is also in need of canned soup, canned veggies, canned fruit, pasta sauce, pasta and other non-perishable items.
Danielle McIntyre, executive director of the Interfaith Food Bank, echoes Tizzard’s sentiments. Food and financial donations are very much needed as well, to not only fulfill immediate needs, but also for budgeting purposes.
“According to our projections that we would be serving about 1,000 households, we’re about two thirds of the way done, so that makes us feel like we’re getting there,” says McIntyre.
 That said, donations haven’t arrived in the mass quantities that the food bank normally sees during the holidays. But McIntyre says she expects that to pick up in the days leading up to Christmas.
 “We do expect to see quite a bit of the donations coming in this week, but the financial donations are not quite where we would want them to be, primarily because our newsletter didn’t make it out before the postal strike.”
 Interfaith has been counting on people giving online or dropping off with financial donations and has seen a number of larger contributions that way. 
“Given the delay with the newsletter, we’re hoping to still get those donations in even if it is not in December,” says McIntyre. “We’re probably going to see some of it coming in January just because of that delay. 
That means their budget for next year, set to be finalized in January, will be based on what was received between October and December. 
“It is going to be a trickier year to budget,” says McIntyre. “We had some hiccups this year with the campaign, the community is struggling a little bit to take care of their own Christmases. But we still see the generosity, we still see the festive spirit in community members.” 
She speculated that some donors might be giving a little bit more than they normally would, and those who have been struggling are either not able to give or have reduced the amount of their donations. 
“Everything is up in the air at the moment.”
Interfaith’s most in-demand items include fresh and frozen foods, as well as halal-friendly and diabetic-friendly foods. It’s also in need of single serving portions such as soup, macaroni and cheese and anything that clients can easily heat and eat.
Both food banks will be closed during the holidays, with the Lethbridge Food Bank closing at the end of the day on Dec. 23 and the Interfaith Food Bank on Dec. 24, with both reopening on Jan. 2.

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