St. George Food Bank faces closure

The St. George Food Bank may soon have to close its doors because of lack of government funding.

For the past two years, the food bank has been pleading with the government to provide more funding to keep its doors open.  Laura Lee Carrier, the food bank’s executive director, said the food bank needs money to expand its quarters, to hire a coordinator, and to cover rising operating costs.

But Carrier said the government has been reluctant to help.

“We have been negotiating for quite a while and we’re not getting anywhere,” she said.

“It’s been a couple of years.  Last year we had even asked for enough funding to pay for a coordinator for the remainder of the ’08/’09 fiscal year but we didn’t get it.  Then it all just got dropped again.”

Carrier said the government has been giving the food bank about $1,000 per month for the last eight years.  That allowance hasn’t changed over the years, despite the increasing operating costs and the food bank’s cries for help.

“There’s overhead costs, like office supplies, freezers, and maintenance, and with heat and lights, and rent, there’s no way $1,000 will cover that,” Carrier said.

“For the $12,000 a year the government invests in organizations like this, we probably put out about $150,000 worth of our resources into the community in terms of furniture, clothing, food, and heat assistance, and that goes up ever single year.”

Carrier said the number of people who depend on the St. George Food Bank has increased threefold over the last couple of years.

She said they currently serve about 50 to 60 families per month, up from about 15 families per month two years ago.

Because of the increased demand, the food bank desperately needs a coordinator to run its operations.

“The food bank is a five day a week business because people are coming all the time with donations and we need someone to coordinate,” Carrier said.

She said the food bank needs an additional $500 per month to keep up with operating costs and pay for a coordinator’s salary.

On top of the financial shortage, Carrier said the space the food bank occupies at 124 Main St. isn’t big enough to hold the inventory of food, clothing, furniture and household items.  She said the 25 volunteers find it difficult working in a small space.

“We’re really, really cramped for space here.  If we just had a little more we could do a lot with it,” she said.

The food bank is asking the government for about $30,000 to $40,000 to expand into the building’s vacant space, which would add 1,500 square feet.

Food bank executives met with New Brunswick Social Development’s  liaison Kevin Clark  on Monday to discuss the food bank’s requests.  Carrier will hear a decision in a few weeks.

Clark wouldn’t comment on the case.

If the government turns down the request, and the food bank can’t find the money through other sources, Carrier said they’ll have to shut the operation down.

Short URL: http://www.newbrunswickbeacon.ca/?p=2043

Posted by Jody Nabuurs on Oct 21, 2009. Filed under News, This Week's Edition. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. Both comments and pings are currently closed.