Need for Harvest Kitchen in Welland ‘not decreasing’
Ongoing issues means still a need to feed the hungry
When the Harvest Kitchen program was created in 2002, the expectation was that the amount of poverty in Welland would eventually decrease and offering a free meal to the city’s less fortunate — up to six nights a week — wouldn’t be required.
Sixteen years later, this isn’t the case. “When we started the program, it was supposed to be a band-aid we hoped would become unnecessary but instead – it keeps becoming completely necessary,” said Rev. Bob Bond, co-ordinator of the effort.
A continuation of the Out of the Cold initiative, which came to a halt in 2015 when the Hope Centre closed its Hope House due to a lack of government funding and offering an overnight shelter to guests was eliminated, Bond said anywhere from 50 to 80 people depend on the dinners throughout the week.
“For some, it’s a resource so people can afford absolutely necessary things like rent,” said Bond.
Although exact figures are not calculated by organizers relating to the number of guests the Harvest Kitchen dinners serve, Bond admitted the need is “not decreasing” and that there are a number of factors that “congregate around poverty.” He attributes the consistent turnout each night to issues such as mental illness, addiction and employment problems.
At the weekly Wednesday dinner at St. Kevin’s Catholic Church, several Notre Dame College students regularly help with making sure everything runs smoothly, and many have to be turned away because of how popular supporting a local cause appears to be at the high school.
“We’re at the point where we have to limit the amount of kids who come because so many want to,” said Anne Harold, a teacher at the school who is also the lead co-ordinator at the church’s night in the program.
“It’s a good problem to have,” she said in the busy kitchen just before a full-course Thanksgiving meal was about to be served.
On Sundays, the Harvest Kitchen runs at Central United Church at 5 p.m, Mondays at 5:30 p.m. at Eglise Sacre-Coeur (Sacred Heart Church), Tuesdays at 5:30 p.m. at the Hope Centre, and Wednesdays at 5 p.m. at St. Kevin’s Roman Catholic Church.
On the first Thursday of each month, the program is offered at the Hope Centre, at
Southridge Church in the second week and Holy Trinity Church on the third week, all at 5 p.m. Sts. Peter and Paul Roman Catholic Church welcome the public on the fourth and fifth Thursdays of the month, and Southridge Church opens its doors for the program on the third and fourth Friday of every month, also at 5 p.m.