Christmas Cheer Board phones ring non-stop to start hamper season

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This article was published 07/11/2023 (719 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The Christmas Cheer Board has already signed up hundreds of Winnipeggers to receive food hampers at a time when normally it wouldn’t even have received its first call.

By the end of Monday, just two business days after opening its phone lines and almost two weeks earlier than when it normally begins public annual operations, it had processed more than 1,000 applications, executive director Shawna Bell said.

“Any other year, we wouldn’t even be open yet,” Bell said Tuesday. “We have been getting three inbound calls every second. It has been pretty hairy. And we are taking calls until Dec. 23, and we won’t open up hampers for pickup until Dec. 3 — there’s still time.

“We are going to try to support everybody that gets to us.”

Last week, Bell said because of inflationary pressures and ongoing high demand on local food banks, the Cheer Board had decided to open a couple of weeks earlier this year.

Nationally, there has been a 32 per cent increase in food bank use in Canada in the last year; in Manitoba, one in four people using a food bank are employed, reports say.

Bell had predicted the local organization might hand out 19,000 food hampers this holiday season — topping its record number of 18,313 in 2022.

The Cheer Board doesn’t yet know if the early rush of calls means there is even a greater need.

“I’m hoping we don’t get hit by a loop,” Bell said. “We do have a finite amount of money, but we still do what we can.”

Money is tight and the Cheer Board has decided to use that limited amount to increase the overall number of hampers it prepares.

For the second year in a row, hampers will not include a turkey. (Bell said a limited survey showed only about 10 per cent of hamper recipients were upset no turkey was included.)

The charitable organization also had to stop supplying community knitters with free wool to fashion scarves and mitts.

The most surprising number in the first few days of this year’s campaign, the 104th in Cheer Board history, was in new applicants, Bell said.

“We are getting an overwhelming number of people who haven’t reached out to us in the past,” she said. “This time of year is a pretty scary place to find yourself. If you are on your own, it’s one thing, but if you have kids, it is even tougher. You don’t want to tell your children you can’t afford Christmas.

“It would be terrible if they also couldn’t get a hamper. We don’t want that to happen.”

Between the Cheer Board and provincial Employment and Income Assistance office, there are a total of 15 phone lines open to apply for a hamper.

“Adding more would cost us more,” Bell said, adding an online application option was looked at but rejected. “There would be a lot of risk. We couldn’t validate addresses.”

To apply to the Cheer Board for a hamper, call 204-989-5683. People with an EIA case number can call 204-948-2022.

kevin.rollason@freepress.mb.ca