Food banks were critically
important for many
during this Covid-19 crisis.
Charnel Anderson is one of TVO's
 Ontario Hub journalists
covering the northwest.
She wrote about Thunder Bay's
experience
earlier this spring, and she
joins us now for an update
from Red Rock, Ontario.
Welcome to the show.
Hi, Jeyan.
Now you wrote about
a centralized food bank
as a solution to the closure of
Thunder Bay's food banks.
How does a centralized
food bank work?
Mm-hm, so as you know, the
pandemic has disrupted
just about everything, including
food banks.
Many food banks are staffed with
elderly volunteers,
so early on in the pandemic,
many food banks decided it would
just be safest to shut down
in order to protect them.
Um, so, but of course people
still need to eat,
so in Thunder Bay, the solution
was to operate
this one central citywide
food bank.
Um, food banks in north western
Ontario operate
in kind of a network.
The head of this network
is the Regional Food
Distribution Association,
also known as the RFDA,
um, and they're not a food
bank at all.
What they do is they receive and
distribute donated food
to member organizations across
north western Ontario.
But the RFDA decided to take the
lead on this issue
and early on, they met with some
of the members,
and they all decided it would be
best to shut down
in order to support the central
citywide food bank.
Um, and the central model, they
ran every other Friday
starting April 17th, outdoors on
the CLE grounds in Thunder Bay.
Um, I had a chance to visit it,
and I thought it was
really well organized, you know,
there were a lot of volunteers
running around, unloading food,
helping to direct traffic.
They had two, um, drive through
areas set up for people,
and two walk up areas adjacent
to bus stops,
so it was very well organized,
and quite efficient
from what I saw.
JEYAN:
But of course, there are some
people who have concerns,
organizations that have concerns
with this model, correct?
I think the biggest concern with
the central food bank
was that it was one central food
bank, you know?
Most of the other food banks in
Thunder Bay shut down.
Some of them were encouraged
to shut down,
they didn't all want to shut
down, but you know,
people who are hungry
at this time,
and they needed the extra food,
they had no choice
but to go to this one
central model,
and one advocate that I spoke to
is worried that, you know,
this one model would limit
access to people
who needed food.
Of course, and then there was
the issue of safety.
As I said, the RFDA and
its members thought that this
would be the safest way to
protect their volunteers
and their clients, um, but
advocates say, you know,
they were concerned about people
who had to carpool,
or had to catch the bus to
the food bank,
because this was at a time that
we are being told
to keep six feet away
from each other.
So what this advocate told me is
they said that this model
asks people to put their hunger
before their safety.
Um, you know, food banks are
starting to open up again now
but there's concerns about a
second wave of Covid-19 coming
and I think people would prefer
to see more locations
across the city if we do in fact
get that second wave.
Charnel, I want to thank
you so much.
Again, another very
important story
from north western Ontario.
That's Charnel Anderson.
Thank you again.
Thank you.
