One of our partners, Christine Fulsang, and her family organized the 6th Annual Weston Downs Food Drive in their neighbourhood to support the Vaughan Food Bank. Unfortunately, the need continues to be great with so many families having to rely on food banks due to the hardships caused by inflation and rising food costs.

The Food Drive was held two weeks earlier this year to coincide with Fall Break for the university students so the whole family could participate. Zena, a black lab pup from Lion’s Foundation Dog Guides, who the Fulsang Family is fostering joined the Food Drive this year as our official mascot.

On Sunday October 6th, Christine, her husband Jim and two high school students attached flyers to the red donation bags (sponsored by KJH Cares) and prepared them for distribution. On Saturday October 12th, the Fulsang Family, volunteers from the neighbourhood and a group of eight high school students delivered the red donation bags to over 2,000 homes in Weston Downs. Although it was a bit windy, it was a beautiful day to go door-to-door and there were a number of residents outside taking advantage of the weather to get yard work done. On Saturday October 19th, 60 volunteers, including 32 students, came out to help with collection day. Some volunteers went door-to-door collecting the red donation bags while others worked at home base unloading bags and sorting donations before they were shipped to the Vaughan Food Bank, removing flyers from the bags and prepping the bags for next year.

In addition, four Crime Prevention Officers from York Region Police joined the Food Drive and assisted at home base. Their recognition and support of our community initiative was greatly appreciated. It was also nice to have extra help to unload bags and sort donations.

The Vaughan Food Bank sent their new truck again this year. The truck can hold eight pallets and has a hoist that allowed us to transfer the donations from the bags to the melon boxes at street level. We set up a “drive thru” style delivery area. Once donations were collected and returned to home base, the bags were unpacked and donations sorted into major categories. Once the melon boxes were full, they were loaded on the truck. The large truck made four trips with the bins fully loaded, plus one load in the small truck and a full load in the Fulsang family SUV. In total, we collected 44 melon boxes of donations–which equates to approximately 33,000 lbs of food!

We also collected over $6,900 in monetary donations. The Vaughan Food Bank was impressed by the results and so grateful for to the Weston Downs community. The generosity of the Weston Downs community is overwhelming! Plans are already in the works for next year with ideas on how we can continue improve the Food Drive.