City Reach food bank renovates, expands service
Donor provides cash to expand cooler and storage area, allowing service to be open twice a week
The City Reach family food bank program will expand to serve about 2,000 people in east Vancouver thanks to an expansion of the society’s cooler and storage area.
A new walk- in cooler will allow the formerly once- weekly Food for Families program to expand and open twice a week, according to executive director Tammy Cheetham.
The Thursday morning food bank will now be open Tuesday evenings as well, to accommodate parents’ working schedules.
Food for Families currently serves about 220 families ( totalling 850 people), offering a wide variety of fresh fruits, vegetables and other nutritious whole foods such as fish, legumes and yogurt — many of which are perishable.
The program is run by the Broadway Church as a non- faith- based mission for local families in need. About 30 per cent of the program’s clients are new immigrants.
“We were at capacity with the number of families we could serve during that Thursday opening and at capacity with the amount of fresh food we could handle,” Cheetham said. A donor associated with the church supplied the money required for the renovation.
City Reach offers regular classes and workshops to teach people how to cook with fresh whole ingredients, prepare nutritious low- cost meals for families and even grow their own food in container gardens.
“We aren’t just giving food out, we are actually educating families on how best use it,” Cheetham said.
Food for the food bank is donated by local farmers, the Salvation Army and companies such as Liberté Yogurt or purchased with private donations.