Food bank hoping to raise $50,000 at Friday fundraiser

By Alejandra Pulido-Guzman on September 22, 2022.

LETHBRIDGE HERALDapulido@lethbridgeherald.com

After a two-year intermission, the Friends of Interfaith Charity Dinner and Silent Auction is coming back to an in-person event Friday with all proceeds going to the Interfaith Food Bank.

“This is our one big fancy fundraiser that we do each year and we’re super excited to be back in person again after a two-year break, where we had to take the event online,” said Danielle McIntyre, Interfaith Food Bank executive director.

She said the last two years they hosted the Feed Lethbridge virtual event, which was a city-wide online dinner party.

“This is our 14th year but a couple years of a break because of COVID and so we’re super glad to be back and all the funds raised from the evening will go directly into food bank programs and services,” said McIntyre.

She said they are aiming to raise about $50,000 total from the event and including sponsorship dollars, ticket sales and proceeds from their live auction, silent auction and raffles.

“This year more than any other year, we need a lot of help. It’s crazy how quickly our numbers are escalating, we did see it coming. Our numbers went down during the pandemic when people had the luxury of temporary financial supports, but now that those have ended people have gone back to work, if they were able to, and now we have the issues with supply chain and inflation, we’re finding that we’re getting a lot of new clients,” said McIntyre.

She said the cost of everything is putting people over the edge, to the point where they do not have enough money for groceries and that is the reason why their clients are increasing.

“We tend to see our numbers go up in the fall as soon as the weather turns, that coupled with everything else that we’re seeing right now, we’re expecting that from now until the end of the year we’re going to require a lot of support from the community in terms of food, money and volunteers,” said McIntyre.

She said fortunately things usually work out one way or another.

“We find that the community steps up for us, so I’m confident that this Friday we’ll be able to go in and say thank you for coming, please give us your money and people will,” said McIntyre.

She said it is easy to give when there are fun things to spend money on and that is why they have a big selection of live auction items and silent auction items for people to spend their money on.

“If you can’t make it to the event, there’s still opportunities to participate and donate,” said McIntyre.

She said she is excited for the fundraising event as the money raised will allow them to buy what they need, and it also allows them to stretch each dollar further.

McIntyre said there is only a very limited amount of tickets left and there will be no tickets available at the door, and therefore anyone interested is asked to contact the food bank directly.

The event will take place Friday at 6:00 p.m. at the Sandman Signature Lethbridge Lodge with dinner music by Dale Ketcheson and musical entertainment by Trevor Panczak.

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