The holidays are a time of giving, but what happens when an organization that gives all year round can’t give during the holidays?

That’s the dilemma the Valemount food bank was given on Wednesday (Dec. 2), as they had to close their doors to save up for Christmas food hampers later in December.

“We’re pretty rough going getting donations and that. We couldn’t have our food bank today, our boxes today, because we had to save some stuff for Christmas hampers. It’s been going pretty rough,” said Dorothy Jones, president of the Valemount food bank. “I think this is our worst year ever. It’s the first year that we’ve had it so bad that we couldn’t give out a Christmas box, like a box for December, we couldn’t give out other than the Christmas hamper.”

Jones posted notes in town saying the food bank will be closed on the usual Wednesday pick up day due to donation shortages, but she says someone has gone around and tore them down.

While the food bank is always looking for food and cash donations, Christmas is especially tough because the food bank puts out Christmas hampers with fresh vegetables (potatoes, carrots, onions) to go along with the turkeys they give out through their Turkey Bucks jars at the grocery store.

“We just try and give each one of the families a turkey. And we have the turkey bucks in the store, and most years we’ve had enough turkey bucks to pretty much pay for our turkeys, but this year even our turkey bucks aren’t even being donated to as much,” said Jones.

About 35 people use the food bank in town every two weeks, which Jones says is a lot for such a small community, and suspects the McBride food bank is having similar troubles.

“They are having a pretty tough time too I guess, by the sounds of it. It’s been tough all over, there’s not much work,” Jones said.

While the food bank is low on food and cash, they are also low on volunteers. Jones says there are four main volunteers that work at the food bank, and a few that help on food bank days. But, she says, it’s usually the same two people, so nobody gets a break.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the Alberta border, the Jasper food bank’s shelves are full. Despite a 61 per cent food bank usage increase in Alberta in the last year, Jasper food bank president Patrick Mooney said the Jasper food bank only saw about a 15 per cent increase in use.

“We seem to be in better shape than they (Valemount) are. Jasper is a very generous community. I’m not sure in Valemount, but here in Alberta we have the Santa’s Anonymous program, and this community is very generous towards that as well,” Mooney said, pointing out that Santa’s Anonymous takes care of Christmas dinners.

So at the Jasper food bank, I would never be in a position where I can’t give out these turkeys because I’ve got to save them for Christmas dinner.” Mooney said.

He said it’s taken a couple of years, but the Jasper Rotary Club food bank drive in the fall takes in a significant amount of food, plus donations from the different locations in town such as the Activity Centre and the Super A, which Mooney says he has been emptying almost once a week.

Last week, the Jasper food bank also received a check donation from ATCO Gas and ATCO Electric for $2745.56. That donation will help buy fresh food for food bank users, rather than just dried goods.

ATCO has many fundraising programs, and the food bank was the primary recipient of this donation, where the company matched everything that the employees donated. In addition to the money, ATCO employees also donated a significant amount of food.

Mooney said the food bank is in a good position, but that could change any week.

“We are in a better position, but that could change next week. But right now, we’ve got food, we are able to service anybody that requests it, and over Christmas time we’re going to bring in another 2,000 pounds of food at least. Another 2,000 pounds from the schools, they gather a bunch, from companies…I’ll get phone calls every day in December saying ‘we just had an office party and collected some food, can you pick it up,’. So it’s very good that way.”