Region's food bank 'in a crisis right now' as it asks for funding increase

The Food Bank of Waterloo Region says they are seeing the highest need for food assistance in their 39-year history and need more than double its annual funding from the region to keep up with demand.

The food bank receives $744,000 each year from the Region of Waterloo, but since community demand for their services has soared, interim CEO Kim Wilhelm said they need $1.6 million in funding in 2024 to expand their services to meet the community's needs.

"I think the first time that we really started seeing it consistently go up was around June 2022 and ever since then it just seems like each month is higher and higher than last month," Wilhelm told CBC K-W.

"Over 36,000 visits are being made each month and continuing to rise."

A presentation Wilhelm delivered to regional councillors Wednesday night showed visits to the food bank has increased by 136 per cent since 2016, and by 31 per cent in the last year alone. More than 7,500 households accessed the food bank for the first time as well, which is an increase of 113 per cent from the previous year.

Wilhelm said inflation, the cost of living and housing are some of the contributing factors as to why they are seeing more people in need. She also said social assistance programs like Ontario Disability Support Program or Ontario Works are not provinding enough money for people to cover their costs.

The increase of food assistance has also been felt at the Cambridge Food Bank. Over the summer, the food bank released a report showing the number of households accessing the food bank was up nearly 200 per cent in the first half of 2023 compared with the first half of 2022.

Dianne McLeod, the Cambridge Food Bank's executive director, said in an interview in July that "the food here ... is going out as fast as we bring it in."

"We used to rely on two food drives a year — one in the fall and one in the spring — and those are certainly our major food drives. But we need to be getting donations all year round just to keep food on our shelves."

Programs and staff are stretched 

Wilhelm said food bank programs and staff are stretched thin and the additional funds will go toward staffing and infrastructure to keep food programs going.

"I think it's fair to say that we are in a crisis right now and our network is not set up to deal with this constant increase that is increasing so rapidly," she said.

Wilhelm said funding they received from the region in 2017-18 worked out to about $3.75 per visit. That number has now dropped to $1.89 as the number of visits soar.

"If funding kept pace with the number of visits, that's where we get the $1.6 million," she said. 

Another added challenge for the food bank is the cost of food, which has meant the number of food donations they receive from the community has dropped. It means the food bank has had to purchase more food now than pre-pandemic years.

Wilhelm said pre-pandemic, the food bank would spend about $200,000 on very specific food purchases and estimates by the end of this year, they will have spent about $2 million on food purchases.

If the food bank doesn't received the additional funds it needs, Wilhelm said she worries there will be staff burn out throughout the network.

"I really worry that without additional funding to help with that staffing and infrastructure piece, we may not have the structure in place to feed our community," she said.