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Home / News / Growing communities: Heartland Challenge volunteers boost Fort Saskatchewan Food Bank
December 18, 2023
United Way’s Heartland Challenge helps strengthen their community through food bank upgrades and volunteer appreciation.
Passionate changemakers in Alberta’s Heartland have joined forces with United Way of the Alberta Capital to give back to their communities, using their unique skills and expertise to make sure no one is left behind.
Started in 2014, the Heartland Challenge is a group of businesses and organizations in the Heartland Region who all participate in United Way workplace fundraising campaigns but also go above and beyond by volunteering their skills to help a community organization right in their backyard.
“If just one company went out, we would make an impact — but it’s not as much as the whole group collectively, especially when we can use our skills and expertise to benefit community partners,” shares Alana Seymour, co-chair for the Heartland Challenge committee.
This year’s project was for the Fort Saskatchewan Food Bank, who recently moved to a larger Nourishment Centre with a larger warehouse and surrounding land ripe for some upgrades and beautification. Over the last year, more than 50 Heartland Challenge volunteers from 13 organizations built garden beds, rainwater collection systems, and a greenhouse to support the Food Bank grow their own produce.
“The garden project had been something that we really hoped for in relocating to this new site,” explains Kassandra Gartner, Executive Director of the Fort Saskatchewan Food Bank.
“We wanted to utilize our undeveloped outside space to produce food and the Heartland Challenge Committee met our every single need with the supplies and the tools. They truly did set us up without our organization having to fund all these initial infrastructure pieces.”
Like many non-profit organizations, the Fort Saskatchewan Food Bank is experiencing a double-sided crunch: more people are experiencing food insecurity and are accessing food bank services, while the rising cost-of-living increases have raised operating costs and led to a decrease in donations. The volunteer project meant the Food Bank could scale what they offer without investing their time and money into the upgrades.
“Now, for a very nominal annual cost, we will be able to produce a significant amount of food and really focus on changing what food banking looks like. We want to provide fresh, healthy, nourishing food, and food banking is not sustainable if we rely on donations to come in so that we can purchase food,” shares Kassandra.
Many of the Heartland Challenge volunteers work in industry, and they were able to use their skills and tap into their networks to source materials for this project. Collectively, the community came together quickly to get the job done.
“We were able to use local companies to buy supplies and materials that we needed, and some of these companies were able to offer discounts and prices. This project shows how this community really works together in helping each other,” describes Leah Show, co-chair of the Heartland Challenge committee.
Alongside the infrastructure investment, the Heartland Challenge also wanted to use this project to give back to the dedicated volunteers who keep the Food Bank running.
Kassandra has a small team of paid staff, while the rest of the operations are led by passionate volunteers. For her, and the Heartland Challenge team, it was so important that volunteers had a welcoming space at the Food Bank.
“Very quickly, Kassandra identified that volunteers are the backbone of the Food Bank. We saw there was a need to highlight and spoil volunteers,” Alana explains.
The Heartland Challenge team built out a breakroom for volunteers and sourced aprons for them to wear during their shift. They also worked with local artist Country-Chic Custom’ Designs to create a beautiful mural, which was unveiled during a volunteer appreciation event the committee hosted.
“That was very valued by our team. It is still being talked about, having that external acknowledgement from our community and our business leaders saying: ‘We see you, we hear you, we appreciate what you’re doing’. That thank you has really bolstered their spirits,” Kassandra shares.
Alberta’s Heartland area is full of companies looking to do local good by partnering with United Way of the Alberta Capital Region. The Heartland Challenge brings these organizations together to work on initiatives that help our local community thrive.
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