Friday August 28, 2020
One Roof Community Centre provides meals 365 days a year to those struggling with food insecurity. One Roof also offers professional training, life skills, community building, harm reduction, access to primary health care and a safe space to be.
When the pandemic hit, everything changed.
With physical distancing guidelines in place, the focus switched to providing emergency food boxes and serving takeout meals. A grant from the COVID-19 Community Response Fund helped pay for food and distribution of the emergency boxes.
“Prior to COVID-19 we prided ourselves on our strong connections with individuals and felt that we had space to meet people’s unique needs,” says Sarah Fleming with One Roof Community Centre. “Unfortunately with physical distancing in place having intimate conversations became challenging and the need to focus on meal distribution in a safe way became our priority.”
“A silver lining of the pandemic is that we have been able to take a step back. Usually open 365 days a year, serving two meals a day and running a seven-hour drop-in kept us very busy,” says Sarah. “We have done some strong reflection on how we must move forward stronger than ever. We will be a stronger team for our community and hope that we can meet the ever changing needs in the future.”
This is a good news story, but more needs to be done.
The COVID-19 Community Response Fund supports ongoing recovery needs as charities and vulnerable residents continue to adapt and recover from the effects of the pandemic.
Please give generously – we are stronger together.
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