SUBMITTED PHOTO - TD Wealth's Neil Mardian, Marc Sorensen and Matt Solberg present food bank executive director Celina Symmonds with a $15,000 donation.
TD Wealth has donated $15,000 to the local food bank and is encouraging others to do the same.
“It is strange to drive around our city and see so many business closed,” says investment advisor Marc Sorensen. “You wonder how the business owners and their staff are coping with the loss of their income these past few weeks. No one could ever imagine that this would happen in our community and throughout the world.”
He and his colleagues, Neil Mardian and Matt Solberg, reached out to the Medicine Hat and District Food Bank on Monday to see how the economic turmoil brought on by COVID-19 is affecting the city.
“We were taken aback to hear that the number of requests for food hampers has risen dramatically these past few weeks from many families who have never needed the food bank to feed their family,” Sorensen said. “This coupled with the high demand for food supplies that has driven up the cost of the food hampers has stretched to the limit our local food bank’s capacity.”
Food bank executive director Celina Symmonds says all the funds donated will go towards its food hampers.
“Each hamper that we’re sending out has about $150 worth of goods in it and we’re sending out 100 a day,” said Symmonds.
She says the food bank has so far been handling about 20 more cases per week than usual since the outset of the COVID-19 crisis two weeks ago, and is preparing for more as it continues.
“We are seeing the needs of families and individuals in the community rise. As people lose their jobs, we know that months down the road, those families may need help as well,” Symmonds said.
