The Most Successful One-Day Community Food Drive in History

Organizers and volunteers across the municipalities in Windsor-Essex, Ontario are ready to say so after experiencing the “June 27th Miracle” food drive.

Inspired by the success of Chatham-Kent’s “May 16th Miracle”, approximately 10,000 volunteers worked safely together – while physically distanced – at over 40 drop-off locations on a food drive that spanned an entire county. A significant portion of the volunteers worked in teams of family members or others in their social circle to cover over 1,800 square km by going home-to-home to pick up non-perishable food donations at many of the 182,000 houses and apartment buildings in the region. Other volunteers staffed rural drop-off depots, all while practicing social distancing and observing health and safety protocols while residents stayed in their cars and volunteers removed items from their vehicle.

Kerri Zold, one of the members of the ten-person organizing committee, says she is still struggling to put into words what she experienced. “I knew Windsor-Essex was a generous community, but the level of support was completely overwhelming” says Zold. “So many people gave in one way or another – time, expertise, leadership, equipment, facilities, signs, food, the list goes on. We are all in awe of everyone that played a part in making this miracle. The willingness to unite for a common goal like this is what makes Windsor-Essex such a fantastic place to live and work.”

This grass-roots initiative was planned and executed in less than four-weeks, starting with an organizing committee of ten people, most of who were not connected to more than one or two others before coming together. They used their respective networks and expertise to engage over 10,000 volunteers from across the region, including several area captains to step up as leaders in their own communities. Close communication along the way with municipalities, the Windsor Essex County Health Unit, and community partners, the Goodfellows and the Windsor-Essex County Food Bank Association, was also paramount.

Josh Lane, another member of the organizing committee, still cannot believe what the community was able to accomplish in such a short period. “An initiative this big with so many logistics to be addressed and coordinated would normally take months to organize,” says Lane. “Several thousand people were mobilized to safely visit thousands of doorsteps and almost 50 drop-off depots. Our community did this in less than four weeks, from first organizing committee meeting to collection. I’m still shocked we pulled it off, but we could not have done so without the generosity of our community and guidance from our friends in Chatham-Kent.”

In the days following June 27th, a consistent feeling of happiness and unity are being shared around the community, especially on social media. Posts from people in every corner of Windsor-Essex have been sharing photos of their donations, their experience that day, hand-made signs promoting participation, and masked volunteers stacking pallet after pallet of food. It is clear people have been inspired and a bit shocked at how much food was collected.

June Muir, President and CEO of the Windsor Essex Food Bank Association and the Unemployed Help Centre is thrilled with what the June 27th Miracle did for the community. “I want to make sure everyone knows what they did on June 27th is going to help our community in Windsor and Essex County” Muir says.

“Without that help we don’t know what we’d do because some of our fundraisers aren’t going to happen this year, so what’s happened truly is a miracle.” She says the community just assured foodbanks can help those in need and struggling with finances during the pandemic. “This food’s going to keep us going and we’re not sure how long this pandemic’s going to last for. We’re very fortunate. Windsor-Essex is very caring. The community has stepped up. That’s what it’s about, helping your neighbours, helping people in a tough time.”

Organizers have finished calculating a rough estimate of how much food was collected. At press time, the estimate is 2,020,500 lbs of food.

Right now these pallets are spanned across multiple sites including but not limited to WFCU Arena (Windsor), Westport Marina (Lasalle), Atlas Tube Centre (Lakeshore), Tecumseh Arena, Libro Centre and (Amherstburg) and in the process of being sorted and distributed to the hungry bellies of those in Windsor-Essex that are struggling with food security.

It’s difficult to quantify exactly how many mouths will be fed by the over 2 million pounds of food collected from the June 27th Miracle, but the Windsor Essex County Food Bank Association (WEFBA), which represents 15 foodbanks in the area, shared some of their metrics which allows a reasonable estimate of the impact to be made. WEFBA served 149,562 people from April 1, 2019 to March 31, 2020, which represents 25,755 unique individuals or 11,324 households accessing one of their food banks multiple times. In that same period, approximately 800,000 lbs. of non-perishable foods were collected and distributed, which equals approximately 70 lbs of food per household or 30 lbs per unique individual served. Therefore, all other things held constant, the estimated 2,020,500 lbs of non-perishable food collected from June 27th Miracle, stands to feed 28,850 households or 67,316 individuals for one year of food bank usage.

WEFBA has already seen a 12% increase in the number served this year between the period of March 16, 2020 and July 3, 2020 (since pandemic started) in comparison to the same period last year and need continues to grow as time goes on, often as a result of people that never visited food banks before needing to access one for the first time. If this trend continues, WEFBA can expect to serve as many as 225,000 which represents 34,300 unique individuals or 13,200 households and would require 1M pounds of nonperishables to maintain what was provided last year, however, they have also increased access limits during the pandemic since many households are only earning 1/2 their salary or less.

If the projection of serving 225,000 this year is correct, this would represent a 50% increase in food bank usage over the 149,562 served last year. There is also a chance we have not yet seen the greatest need as supports like CERB and mortgage deferrals, etc. have helped alleviate some financial pressure from many households.

Windsor-Essex, like virtually every community around the globe, is facing an unprecedented global crisis.

Food bank usage is at an all-time high while food bank donations are at all-time lows. With this as the backdrop and this initiative provided an opportunity to do good together, while apart. On Saturday, June 27th, a miracle took place in Windsor-Essex and is another perfect example of what can be accomplished when a community unites toward a common goal.

The organizing team was headed by Tracey Bailey, Steve Desjardins, Matt Hernandez, Steve Ilijanich, Mark Jones, Adam Lally, Josh Lane, Josh Spadafora, Steve Truant, Kerri Zold plus the hundreds of other volunteers around Windsor-Essex.