THUNDER BAY — Seeing a need for access to food in the community, the Lakehead Choral Group decided to support the Regional Food Distribution Association through their spring concert.
With a theme of ‘be the change,’ the group collected monetary and nonperishable donations for the RFDA on Wednesday at St. Agnes Church.
“We were just trying to draw together, to share our music with a group. How could we be the change?
"That was the theme (chosen by) our musical director Diana Hannaford-Wilcox and it's a beautiful idea. We hope we're starting a trend here that we'll be able to support a group or two each year,” said Marianne Jollineau, publicity coordinator for the Lakehead Choral Group.
“We have two concerts a year, Christmas and spring. There's such a huge need and if everybody does just a little bit, it makes such an amazing change and it creates awareness to what the RFDA is doing.”
Music is healing, Jollineau said.
“How can we help draw the two together to mutually help each other, but especially the food security needs right now are so high, so we're grateful to be able to pair up. People are very generous. We're super grateful to be able to just ask them and they come,” she said.
The capacity at St. Agnes Church is 520 people, Jollineau said, 400 tickets were sold and typically a few more are sold at the door.
“We have The Finnish Bookstore, Rollason Flowers and Northern Unique Bakery that help us have outlets so people are out and about and want to pick up a ticket and also help support those businesses too.”
To be a help in the community is a good feeling, Jollineau said.
“It's just a drop in the bucket, but we hope to be able to increase that as the years go on. That's our vision.
“People are here dropping off nonperishable goods very generously and also cheques and we invite the public to head to the door. They're right on Syndicate and they're doing a major expansion, the shelves are really empty right now, so it's really important. If you got four cans, bring them to two, if everybody just a little bit, it makes a huge impact. This is our little effort to be the change,” Jolllineau said.
Alexandra Grzelewski, the RFDA’s horticulturist and community engagement coordinator, said having fundraisers of this sort are so important.
“Right now, there are a lot of people that are having to access food banks. It really takes community to help solve these issues, so having an event like tonight is so important.
“The RFDA helps support pretty much every food bank in Thunder Bay, so we are quite widespread.”
Grzelewski said the donations will help not only Thunder Bay but also the region.
“This food will go into our warehouse and it will go out to who needs it first, so that could be regionally or locally,” she said.
“I would just like to thank everybody that organized this event. It's fantastic.”
