The Salvation Army’s food banks in Smithers and Houstom are in need of some donations and more helping hands.
“Donations typically will go down in the summer,” said Corps Officer Lt. Rick Apperson. “But we usually have better food reserves going into summer. However, with lower reserves, we will feel the impact more. Additionally, the high price of groceries has been impacting our overall donations.”
He said their shelves aren’t completely empty, they have an excess of pasta and canned corn. Beyond that they have enough food on hand to cover maybe a month’s worth of food bank appointments if they are careful.
The food banks have seen an increase of about 25-50 per cent more users in the last couple of years.
The Christmas Hampers in Houston have increased 100 per cent from this time five years ago.
Anyone looking to donate can bring in any non-perishable food item.
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“We can use everything at the moment (except pasta and canned corn) including cereal, mac & cheese, canned meat, other canned vegetables, canned beans, spaghetti sauce, and canned fruit,” said Apperson.
The Salvation Army is also looking for some more volunteers.
“During COVID we had to change up how we were delivering our services and in following guidelines, we had to operate with limited staff and had to work without most of our volunteers,” he said. “Now that we are out of those restrictions, and planning to re-open our drop-in centre after our current renovations are completed, we could use volunteers to help sort food, serve snacks and coffee and help with other programming needs.”
People can contact Kelly Spurway or Apperson to volunteer at either of the food bank locations in the Bulkley Valley.
@MariscaDekkema
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