The Emergency

By Gary Payne, MBA At North House in Uxbridge, the new food pantry offers something you might not expect to need when picking up groceries. An appointment. Clients register, then book half an hour to choose from shelves stocked with food and household essentials. If they can’t get there, staff can help them choose by phone or video and arrange delivery. When the pantry opened in September, its staff explained why that mattered. In a small town, you can run into somebody you know almost anywhere. Executive director Nathan Gardner mentioned the possibility of meeting someone from school or work while asking for help. Jennifer MacKay, North House’s housing services manager, said the appointments offered a degree of privacy that wasn’t always possible elsewhere. I’d never given much thought to that part of visiting a food bank. Needing the groceries is difficult enough. Then there’s the possibility of everyone knowing you need them. On Jan. 16, 1981, the Edmonton Gleaners Association became Canada’s first food bank. Its founders had noticed two things: people were going hungry, and perfectly edible food was being wasted. They wanted to connect the two. Food banks spread through the recession years that followed. In 2001, Edmonton’s Food Bank published a history to mark its 20th anniversary. Eleanor Boddy, chair of its board, acknowledged the contributions of volunteers and donors, but also wrote, “It is unfortunate that the need for a Food Bank in Edmonton continues.” That was 25 years ago. Even then, the anniversary wasn’t entirely a celebration. On Oct. 21, Food Banks Canada released its latest HungerCount report. It describes a system designed as a temporary emergency response, now being asked to provide long-term support. Temporary is an odd word for something that turned forty-five in January. Across Canada, food banks recorded more than two million visits in March. Here in Durham, Feed the Need’s network of food banks and other community food programs recorded more than 880,000 visits over the past year. Those are visits, not different people. Nearly one in five food bank clients nationally reports employment as the main source of income. Feed the Need says one in four Durham households experiences food insecurity. Having work, it seems, no longer guarantees having enough for groceries. I wouldn’t put any of this at the feet of donors. North House’s pantry came together through community donations and partnerships. It isn’t intended to replace Loaves and Fishes, but to work alongside it. The problem is that even the best-stocked pantry can’t make rent cheaper or stretch a paycheque any further. Back in Uxbridge, North House has made room for people to choose their groceries without worrying so much about who might see them. It’s a thoughtful thing to do. We keep finding thoughtful ways to live with an emergency that was supposed to be temporary.