Tag Archive: resilience

  1. Flood protection funding is a community victory!

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    Flood protection funding is a community victory!

    On July 16, North York Harvest Food Bank was hit hard by a devastating flood that resulted in a power outage, infrastructure damage, and $20,000 of spoiled food.

    Our community has faced terrible floods before, and we knew it wasn’t if, but when it would happen again.

    Several of our partner agencies and countless community members were also reeling from the effects: displaced from their homes, property damage, loss of essential food supplies and services, and more.

    After the flood, North York Harvest Food Bank, Youth Without Shelter, Room to Grow Food Bank, the Mount Dennis Community Association, and the Black Creek

    A crowd of people including Federal NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh listens as North York Harvest Executive Director Ryan Noble gives a tour of the facility

    Alliance joined together to discuss the effects of the flood, and how we could move collaboratively toward solutions.

    Our discussions emphasized the urgent support needed from the government to alleviate the strain on our non-profits and our community.

    We were joined by Federal NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh, who met with community members affected by the flood, amplified our concerns and supported our call for long-term solutions in a letter addressed to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

    On August 30 an investment of $323-million from the City of Toronto and the federal government was announced to bolster the Rockcliffe-Smythe area against future flooding!

    A man stands and gives a presentation during a community discussion at North York Harvest Food Bank with a whiteboard in the background covered in notes.“This is the power of advocacy and community,” says Ryan Noble, Executive Director of North York Harvest Food Bank. “When we come together and fight for our community, we win. When we join our voices together and put pressure on the government to notice, it can work.

    “We’re proud to have stood with our partners and neighbours who have been raising alarm bells about this issue for years, and we’re hopeful it will bring relief for our community.”

    Several people stand in front of a backdrop with the North York Harvest Food Bank logo, smiling for a group picture.

  2. North York Harvest Receives Feed Ontario Innovation Award

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    North York Harvest Receives Feed Ontario Award for Innovation!

    Every year, the Feed Ontario Awards for Excellence honour food banks that have demonstrated exceptional work in innovation, advocacy, and leadership among Ontario’s network of food banks. The awards are presented each year at Feed Ontario’s annual conference, which was held this June in Kingston, Ontario.

    North York Harvest Food Bank is proud to announce we are the recipients of the prestigious Innovator Award this year!

    The Innovator Award, a significant recognition in the food bank sector, is presented to a food bank that has demonstrated innovation in programming, service, or sustainability.

    Seven people stand in a line smiling for a photo. Two people in the centre hold an award between them for Feed Ontario's Innovation Award.

    North York Harvest’s unique, community-driven initiatives create local jobs, provide valuable skills training, and ensure robust community food programs. This innovative approach not only meets immediate needs but also empowers individuals, building a stronger, more resilient community.

    “Toronto is facing an unprecedented crisis of affordability, poverty and food insecurity. North York Harvest is seeing record levels of food bank usage,” says Ryan Noble, Executive Director at North York Harvest Food Bank.

    “We understand free food is only a temporary fix and that traditional charitable models fall short of solving long-term food insecurity. We have long championed a holistic approach to supporting individuals struggling with poverty alongside strategies that foster our local economy and generate wealth in our communities,” he says.

    Our programs include:

    • Foodreach: A collaborative food purchasing program enabling hundreds of community partners to access food at reduced costs. The funds generated from FoodReach are invested back into NYHFB, helping to sustain our emergency food support by providing no-cost food to their member agencies and food banks.

     

    • Leadership in Logistics: A community-focused initiative of North York Harvest Food Bank that has been instrumental in empowering and investing in food bank clients. By offering paid training opportunities in logistics, warehousing, and materials handling, the program has equipped participants with a forklift certification and placed them in jobs at distribution centres, where they earn a living wage with benefits.

    “Each year, Feed Ontario presents awards to honour and acknowledge the exceptional work being done in food banks across our network,” said Carolyn Stewart, Chief Executive Officer at Feed Ontario. “In every corner of Ontario, food banks are working tremendously hard to ensure that everyone in their community has access to nutritious and healthy food.”

    Thank you to Feed Ontario for this recognition, and thank you to our staff, volunteers, partners and donors who make this transformative work possible!