Food Depot puts your Centraide donation to work
Every week, 200 households — roughly 500 people — use the food bank at 2121 Oxford St. in Notre Dame de Grâce.
“We cover every demographic,” said NDG Food Depot director Michael Kay, “all levels of educations, all languages, all types of households, healthy people and disabled, employed and unemployed.” Some students, too.
Kay says “about 65 per cent use the Food Depot for a few years, but some just come here in a crisis.” He sees people from outside NDG, too, because “we’re one of the few that carries baby formula.”One-quarter of the food bank users are children under the age of 14.
The NDG Food Depot is open Mondays from 5 to 7 p.m. and Wednesdays and Fridays from 10 a.m. to noon. Its mandate is threefold: to improve access to healthy and affordable food, to help users deal with issues around poverty, and to sensitize the public to poverty and hunger.
Centraide, the fundraising umbrella organization currently campaigning across Quebec, covers about one-third of the Food Depot’s budget. The rest is made up from individual, corporate and church donations, and a membership fee of $5 a year.
They can always use donations of non-perishable food, such as baby food, macaroni and cheese, cans of tuna or beans, vegetables and fruit, but one of the best ways to do your bit is to pledge a few dollars to Centraide. You’ll never miss that double latte, and you’ll know that indirectly, you helped a child have a good breakfast.
On Nov. 17, six-time Juno nominee Jeri Brown presents A Tribute to George Gershwin at the Oscar Peterson Concert Hall. She’ll be joined onstage by Craig Morrison, Aaron Doyle (trumpet) and the ConChord Jazz Choir. It starts at 8 p.m., and the proceeds of this concert will go to Centraide, as the campaign winds down for another year. Tickets are $20, $15 for students, at the OPCH box office and Admission (514-790-1245).
If you act fast, you may be able to get the last crumbs of home baking courtesy of the Concordia Centraide volunteers. Tuesday and Thursday of this week were designated “Days of Caring,” with baking on sale at several points on campus.
The raffles to reward early-bird pledges have so far seen four winners: Sandra Robinson (Accounting), Benoit Léger (Études françaises), L.J. Sanders (Classics, Modern Languages and Linguistics) and Enza De Cubellis (Office of the President).
Barbara Black