You can help fill a St. John ambulance with food for Newmarket Food Pantry

You can help fill a St. John ambulance with food for Newmarket Food Pantry

On Saturday, volunteers from St. John Ambulance will be at the Metro grocery store at 1111 Davis Dr. in Newmarket from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m., loading up an ambulance full of food and money donations for the Newmarket Food Pantry.

“We know that during this time of need, we can to help support our community, not just with first-aid education. If our units are not being used, why not do this? It’s a fun way to get people to come out to donate and help the community,” said Stephen Watkins, public relations officer for the York Region branch.

The St. John volunteers will also be at the Aurora Metro at Yonge and Henderson from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Sunday, March 28 to collect donations for the Aurora Food Pantry.

“This is a fun event for our volunteers, but it’s also an important one because it impacts so many families. So are we are trying to do this twice a year for each pantry,” Watkins said.

The Newmarket Food Pantry helps almost 2,000 families every week, and Watkins said the focus really is on helping that organization.

“This is really a food pantry event, not a St. John Ambulance event. We are here to help the food pantry,” he said. 

The FILL-an-AMBULANCE campaign began with a single food drive in Newmarket in 2019, was expanded to include Aurora in 2020, and was expanded again this year to include Richmond Hill.  

Last Saturday, the stop at Richmond Hill saw three tonnes of food donations come in, as well as monetary donations. 

“We are talking about multiple ambulance trips to deliver the donations. It really filled up,” said Watkins.  “It’s like a challenge for the public to come out and fill this ambulance.”

Newmarket printing business Allegra has donated banners that will be placed on the ambulance to help draw attention to the food drive as people arrive at the grocery store.

Those who come to donate are asked to focus on getting non-perishable food items for the most part. Watkins notes that Metro puts together $5 and $10 donation bags with an assortment of items inside, so those are always a good choice. People can also donate some money, which can be used to buy even more food in bulk. 

Published at Thu, 25 Mar 2021 14:34:54 +0000