Know Your Neighbour: Fort York Food Bank’s Julie LeJeune
THE GREEN LINE
VIDEO STORY
Know Your Neighbour: JULIE LEJEUNE
Fort York Food Bank executive director, Julie LeJeune, talks about the community-oriented services and goals at one of Toronto's oldest food banks.
Julie LeJeune has served as Fort York Food Bank's executive director since 2022.
: Sebastian Tansil/The Green Line.
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Caring mastermind who loves spending quality time with friends and family. Empathetic and precise economist by training. Loves amber yellow as it reminds him of people dearest to him.
September 21, 2024
This video was produced by a youth journalist who participated in The Green Line's Alexandra Park Youth Journalism program in partnership with Scadding Court Community Centre. It's part of the series "Know Your Neighbour," which profiles the people and places important to community members in Alexandra Park, Kensington Market and Chinatown.
Unlike most people, the staff at the Fort York Food Bank strive to work themselves out of their jobs, says executive director Julie LeJeune.
The food bank (FYFB) is a local charity in Kensington Market at the intersection of College and Borden streets. Operating almost every day of the week since 1998, it provides low-income families and community members with a three-day supply of groceries and hot meals.
In recent years, demand at the food bank has been mounting, mirroring the jump in food prices, which have increased 25 per cent across Canada since 2020, according to The Green Line's calculation based on data from Statistics Canada's consumer price index.
LeJeune says FYFB has been serving over 5,000 people per week - the majority of whom are employed individuals who are in the 18 to 45 age range. For comparison, pre-COVID, the food bank served 1,000 people per week, and the majority were elderly people.
While providing immediate relief for their clients in the form of groceries is a top priority, FYFB's long-term goal is to be a multi-service agency that helps reconnect people with the community, LeJeune says. She adds that volunteers try to connect community members with housing, legal or tax resources to help them build a solid foundation for their future.
"Our heart and soul is to be able to try and reconnect people, so that they can provide for themselves and not have to come to the food bank."
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