Packing edible help for families

SINCE May this year the Ballarat Foundation, Salvos and Ballarat Community Health have been delivering food relief bags around the city as part of the response to the COVID-19 crisis.

Volunteers and staff have been buying, packing and taking bags of groceries to Ballarat families impacted by the pandemic.

Ballarat Foundation youth program manager Stacey Oliver said they became aware that an increased amount of families needed food at the time and acquired funding to help.

“The Foundation received funding initially from United Way Australia and we used that as a COVID response,” she said.

“On average, we’ve been doing around 240 packages a fortnight to deliver to schools and then they distribute out to their families and international students and migrant refugees.

“The schools identify the families that need it, it’s all confidential we don’t know who they’re going to, we just provide a number of bags to the schools.”

With the school year wrapping up, so too is the Ballarat Foundation’s food relief program and Ms Oliver said it was a great opportunity to thank those who contributed and volunteered.

“It’s all volunteer run, we’ve utilised our L2P mentors as the packers and deliverers and we use our L2P vehicles to drive them around,” she said. “We’re so grateful to everyone who has helped along the way.”

Thanks to United Way Australia and a variety of other donors including 3M Corporation, Australian Communities Foundation, Bendigo Bank, Apex Ballarat and Ballarat Italian Association, Ms Oliver said the initiative could assist many struggling families with dignity and in privacy.

“The families are really grateful to receive the packages, it obviously helps one bag of groceries might save them a bit of money to put towards something else,” she said.

“The schools have been certainly grateful, and it has given them an opportunity to provide outreach to their families, particularly while in lockdown.”