THUNDER BAY – Volker Kromm says as Christmas nears, the Regional Food Distribution Association is scrambling to meet everyone’s needs.
It’s exponentially more difficult in the midst of a pandemic.
On Wednesday the organization, which supplies food to food banks throughout the city and into the region, got a bit of a financial boost, thanks to a donation of $14,500 from Unifor, money collected from the seven local chapters and the national office.
Gary Bragnalo, Unifor’s national representative in Thunder Bay said it’s been a tough year for everyone, many of his membership included, but it says a lot about the importance of the RFDA, especially as the holidays approach about the willingness of workers to give so much.
This year’s donation was nearly $4,000 more than last year’s, Bragnalo said, calling it the union’s number one donation target.
“We picked this one years ago. We figured we had the downsizing in forestry and stuff like that before. And now you’re seeing Bombardier going down. Probably some of our members are in hard times and they may have to use this,” Bragnalo said.
“Plus, it’s for the whole community and this is our way of giving back to the community and probably, we figured, the best place to do it.”
Kromm, the RFDA’s executive director, said he and his staff are busy preparing Christmas hampers and said as a result they do have a lot of extra food costs and other expenses to make the holidays a happy time for as many people as possible.
The money from Unifor, which has donated more than $90,000 over the past six years, is crucial at this time of year.
“We count on their support and we appreciate their philosophy of giving back to the community. They’ve had some tough times, so for them to be so generous and so steady in their support, gives us a lot of comfort and we’re very grateful for it,” Kromm said.
There’s extra need this year, he added.
“The food requirement is there and we get people coming from various places, some bulk, some locally donated, but the issue is there are always lots of food expenses, such as various proteins, and I always mention peanut butter,” Kromm said.
“Those kinds of things that we all rely on, they don’t always come in the volumes we need. So we’re going to be spending a lot of extra money to make sure our hampers have things like protein ... This donation from Unifor comes at a good time for that.”
