Agincourt Community Church Teams Up with Councillor for Food Drive
This weekend, Saturday May 9th, saw a wonderful partnership between The Salvation Army Agincourt Community Church and Ward 22’ City of Toronto Ward 22 Councillor Jim Karygiannis.
When approached by Councillor Karygiannis to distribute free face masks and hand sanitizers to those in need, The Salvation Army jumped on board right away.
“Jim called me and said ‘Scott, I have an idea. Can we use your parking lot for distributing hand sanitizers and face masks?’” said Scott Allen, Lieutenant and Corps Officer/Pastor of the Agincourt Community Church. Residents were also being encouraged to bring non-perishable food donations “in their trunks and donate it to the food bank at the Army.”
Constituents were then contacted and the Army saw upwards of 350 registrations for Saturday’s initiative.
And the cold weather and surprise snow didn’t hinder anyone from coming by the Church.
“There has been a steady stream of cars since 10AM this morning,” Scott added.
At the end of the day, close to $3000 was raised and 1850 pounds of food items collected in support of the food bank.
“Events like these really help when the demand is so high,” Scott noted.
Last week alone, the Agincourt Community Church food bank saw close to 18 families seek assistance from The Salvation Army. The food bank hours changed in accordance to this demand, open now from Monday-Thursday instead of the usual 3 days.
“Some people are weary because they’ve never used a food bank before,” said Fae Sturge, Community Services Worker at the Agincourt Community Church.
“We ask people what they normally eat, so they aren’t receiving random food stuff. This way there is no food waste and people get what they are looking for. This is a huge multicultural area and so there are a variety of dietary needs and restrictions. We aim to make sure that we are distributing food that people can actually have.”
The current global pandemic has seen a shift in many things in our daily lives, and the role of The Salvation Army is more important than ever.
“We want to create an environment where we respect every person coming through here and allow them to maintain their dignity through the process,” added Fae.
