The Hagersville Food Bank has been blessed in so many ways since its beginnings in 2012. We have had some amazing volunteers devote countless hours to our success, and we have had strong relationships with our local schools, churches and businesses. The largest blessing and our biggest asset has been the community of Hagersville. Without their unwavering support for those less fortunate among us, our efforts would be significantly more difficult. Our recent good fortune of the Catch the Ace windfall, thanks to the Lions and Hagersville Rocks, has left us with a chance to significantly enhance our mandate of providing food to those in need, we searched for a method that would make the biggest impact to our community.
Today we are providing cheques of $20,000 each to the Food Banks of Cayuga, and Six Nations, the Jarvis Caring Cupboard, the Caledonia Food Bank and the Salvation Army of Dunnville Food Bank. We felt that sharing our good fortune in Haldimand was of benefit to a lot of people.
We are also providing $44,500 to the Child Nutrition Network administered by REACH, to increase the existing school snack programs in Hagersville Elementary, Walpole North and St.Mary's Catholic school to 5 days a week. By doing this, we hope to ensure nutrition and healthy learning for the children of our area.
We continue to look for other initiatives in our area and are working with Lloyd S King School on the Mississauga of the Credit to enhance their school snack program. We are also beginning the search for larger premises that have space for a certified kitchen to allow us to expand our programs to benefit the community. We are also beginning the search for paid staff. Our volunteers have done an amazing job, but the hours committed can be long and volunteer burn out is becoming an issue.
With the economic conditions we are all experiencing; the services we provide are needed by more of our community residents that ever. The cost of food has increased our costs as well, to the point that our monthly grocery bill is surpassing $13,000. Though this windfall has ensured our security, we continue to need local support more than ever through donations and volunteers.
Your ongoing support of our work is appreciated more than we can possibly express here. Thank you