Serving up hope is at the heart of the 23 Days of Christmas initiative, as Select People Solutions and Teamworks Career Centre launch the 17th annual Meals on Wheels Christmas fundraising campaign.
The campaign sponsors 2,000 meals in December with the help of local businesses and individuals stepping up to sponsor a day’s worth of meals.
More than $374,000 has been raised to support this valuable local organization with the goal of hitting the $400,000 milestone.
According to Teamwork Training President Ryan Miller, the campaign is off to a great start with all the days in December already sponsored.
The campaign is now focusing on extended sponsor days into January and selling out the limited supply of Meals on Wheels Christmas cards for $30, in partnership with Cupper’s Coffee and Tea.
Cupper’s will donate the cost of one hot meal per card sold to the Meals on Wheels organization.
Businesses, community groups and individuals can support this campaign by becoming Honourary Chefs and sponsoring either a full day at $1,000 or a half day at $500 of meals.
“It’s more than just a hot meal. These services provide the opportunity for people to visit and ensure recipients are doing OK. The services this organization provides is so valuable to our community,” Miller notes.
Amy Cook is the support services manager at the Lethbridge Senior Citizens Organization and oversees the Meals on Wheels program. “This is truly a life-changing campaign.”
“It’s something we know is not possible without the village of community that steps in. We rely very heavily on this money year-round. It makes up about 10 per cent of our deficit we accumulate yearly in order for us to continue to subsidize meals and feed people,” adds Cook.
At the end of the day, Cook notes, food is a basic human right. “To be able to show people you’re worthy of a meal – to us, a lot of us get to go home and we get to eat, and that’s just kind of a given. To other folks, it’s simply not.”
Whether people are low income or unable to cook for themselves, the idea that every day they get a meal is something clients don’t take for granted, adds Cook.
Because of this campaign, and the sponsors and volunteers, Cook says the organization can keep costs low.
