Carl DeLine

The Salvation Army food bank shelves are empty just weeks before thousands of hungry families will start arriving asking for Christmas hampers.

Unless donated food and money starts coming in “by the tractor-trailer load” some local families may go without Christmas dinner this year, Capt. Gordon Goodridge said Friday.

The need this year is enormous. Goodridge said the Salvation Army needs enough canned goods to stack them 35,000 feet into the air… “where the jets fly. I look up into the sky and think, ‘Wow.'”

Goodridge also figured he would need about $1 million to buy groceries and complete Sally Ann hampers.

This year is no different from any other year, Goodridge said, although last year he got “quite a scare” because the food was late coming in. A desperate plea for help brought a huge public response.

He said he expects Calgarians will come through with donations, as they have in the past.

Carl DeLine, director of the Inter-Faith Food Bank, said volunteers from his project will work with the Salvation Army in the collection of food for Christmas hampers, and may also have food to donate, but the Salvation Army will be responsible for distribution.

The food bank will continue to provide emergency food boxes to families. They hand out as many as 80 boxes a day containing one week’s supply of food.

Last Christmas, about 400 food boxes were distributed on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. DeLine expects that will happen again this year.

Goodridge expects food will start coming in mid-December, “but I would really love it if people could get into the Christmas spirit the first week of December.” That would give volunteers more time to pack hampers.

Goodridge said “99 percent” of the applications for a Christmas hamper are already in. About 6,000 hampers will be distributed this year to needy Calgarians between Dec. 17 and 23 at the Salvation Army Family Services Centre, 1439 17th Ave. SE.

About 5,500 Christmas hampers were distributed last year. Goodridge didn’t see this year’s increase in families as significant.

Three-quarters of the hampers–filled with about $175 worth of Christmas dinner fixings and toys–will go to families–the rest to singles and couples. Goodridge said the hamper has enough food to be stretched for meals four or five days beyond Christmas Day.

Goodridge said he could really put to use “food by the case from big food suppliers. We’d sure appreciate it from them.”

Food, toys and cash or cheque donations may be left at Salvation Army and food bank centres.

Originally published November 28, 1987 by the Calgary Herald (Calgary, AB), credited to Susan Braungart.