Need triggers a bigger response from local Goodfellows
Windsor’s economy might appear hot, with the city experiencing some of its lowest unemployment rates in decades, but that hasn’t stopped a rising tide of people in need of help.
In its latest survey of demand, the downtown Goodfellows food bank saw a 50-per-cent jump in food boxes handed out to single people, from 260 boxes in October 2017 to 390 boxes in October 2018. The number of free food boxes handed out to families also jumped significantly over that period, from 239 in 2017 to 399 this past October.
“It means to me that, despite everything we see and think about the economy being good, apparently it isn’t,” said Goodfellows president Gil Barichello.
On a cold Tuesday, there was another lineup of hungry people seeking help at the food bank. Barichello said the Goodfellows, who started handing out Christmas baskets to the needy in 1910, has been expanding its local operations to help more people more often. The food bank has gone from a once-every-two-months operation to now monthly.
With Families First funeral home as a major sponsor, the Goodfellows also fund a breakfast program that serves morning meals to about 1,500 students at nine local elementary schools.
Last year, the Goodfellows paid for locally referred students in junior kindergarten to Grade 8 to be sized and outfitted with about 1,600 pairs of shoes and boots. The footwear program started with a quiet referral from a teacher who spotted a student with holes in their shoes.
“We say, no kids are to be ignored,” said Barichello. From Thursday to Saturday this week, up to 600 volunteers will be hitting the streets in Windsor, LaSalle and Tecumseh to hawk special edition newspapers and collect funds for the Goodfellows. Almost half the money the charitable organization spends annually will be raised this week, much of it for the Christmas hampers distributed to families next month. Registration deadline to receive a Christmas basket is Dec. 7. “All the money raised in the community stays in the community,” said Barichello.
With the exception of one paid employee — an office administrative assistant — and the cost of upkeep for the organization’s downtown building at 401 Park St., Barichello said most of the money raised — 83 cents of every dollar donated — goes into the food bank and school and community programs.
Almost everything the local Goodfellows organization does is run by volunteers — people like Madelene Chase, the 2018 Goodfellow of the Year. Barichello said it’s folks like Chase who make everything possible at the Goodfellows. He said she stepped up in a big way following the 2017 death of longtime general manager Colleen Renaud, a pillar of Windsor’s charitable community.
“I like helping people out, helping the less fortunate,” said Chase, a retired Children’s Aid Society bookkeeper.
“You see a lot of people and they’re so appreciative.” Chase said she remembered spending her vacations with the Goodfellows when she was a student and her mother was a big volunteer.
“When my mother passed away in 2010, I called and asked if they needed help, and they said, ‘Come on in.’”
Since following in her mother’s footsteps, Chase said she mainly volunteers around the office. A lot of what she does, she said, is “going and doing things without asking.” Last year’s newspaper drive brought in almost $300,000, a figure Barichello calls “spectacular.” With even Thursday ’s high temperature expected to remain below freezing, organizers anticipate a super-chilly first day of fundraising for the volunteers.
But for those who volunteer to do good things, there’s an upside to such cold misery. “When the weather is bad, people seem to be more generous than on a sunny day,” said Barichello.
I like helping people out, helping the less fortunate. You see a lot of people and they’re so appreciative.