Fresher and healthier
Upper Room food bank caps a great decade, plans to improve service
Mike MacDonald stands in the storage room of the Upper Room food bank in Charlottetown, surrounded by plenty of food – cartons of eggs, loaves of bread and boxes of fruits and vegetables.
The busy lead-up to the holiday season is over, and the executive director is pleased to still have a good supply of food on hand. He's even more pleased that so much of it is fresh.
That's because in 2020 one of the ways he hopes to improve services offered at the Upper Room on Belmont Street and the soup kitchen on Richmond Street is by providing more perishable food items.
“To increase the quality of the product is important to us," he said during a Dec. 27 interview.
While they can’t be stored as long, MacDonald wants to put emphasis on providing fresher and healthier foods.
MacDonald also emphasized the support and generosity of Islanders – something he has increasingly noticed since he began this job in 2001.
“Honestly, every year is tremendous, and this year is no exception,” he said.
Last week alone, the Upper Room was able to provide about 400 Christmas hampers – packages which contained fresh foods to make a turkey dinner. It also handed out about 400 individual turkeys, largely to churches and organizations to provide for their respective communities.
As well, volunteers at the soup kitchen hosted a traditional Christmas day meal for about 75 people.
“It was a great atmosphere for sure,” MacDonald said.
As the decade comes to a close, the Upper Room is preparing to enter its slow season. Typically, between Thanksgiving and Christmas is when it sees its most food and cash donations, MacDonald said.
“It’s really a crucial time for us.”
Sometimes that means from January to about April, supplies start running low. But MacDonald has no concerns this time around, recognizing it’s just a part of their yearly cycle.
“Our donations do drop considerably,” he said. “(But) right now, we’re pretty comfortable with where we’re at.”
Once winter is through, donations will spike up again and start the cycle anew.
In addition to providing fresher and healthier foods in 2020, the Upper Room hopes to better its services by listening to and being open to the ideas of others. MacDonald and organization volunteers can’t think of everything, so if anyone has a suggestion that’d help them improve, they’re all ears, he said.
Ultimately, MacDonald hopes to one day close the Upper Room food bank for good.
It’s not to say he wants to leave the people of Charlottetown without the food or resources they may need. Rather, the non-profit's executive director simply hopes for the hardships people may be going through to improve so that Upper Room's services are no longer needed.
“We continue to see way too many people using our service.”