Day 3 - Operation Sharing's Mayor's Food Bank Challenge

Yesterday I lived on my Tuna Casserole from my simulated food bank box. The milk the recipe called for was 25% of my weeks ration. My vitamin content from the box was 0. This is not what someone eats to be healthy. I had a headache last night which only is clearing up now - I rarely get headaches so I attribute it to the preservatives. Me, I am more prone to give headaches to others - Ask our local council - they will agree.

Living on a budget is nothing new for me. In my last decade I have had many opportunities to have to do it. Actually in my management career I rarely get a budget because when I show up the company usually doesn't have any money anyways. Being frugal is ingrained in my psyche which is why I am excited about all the possibilities that being Mayor of Ingersoll can bring to help out your wallets.

It's tough out there for a lot more people than the 1619 folks on Ontario Works in Oxford county. There are likely 16,000 Oxford County residents that are the working poor. Another 16,000 that are on fixed income meaning Old Age pension and disability pensions. Add a few that don't even show up on the stats and likely 1/3 of Oxford Countys' residents are just getting by. Then there are likely 50% that have curtailed their spending to compensate for the nibbles at their wallets from increases in tuition, utilities, hidden taxes, gas prices and curtailed working hours. This shows up in smaller receipts at restaurants, fewer folks at charity events and  reduced traffic at boutique shops etc. I don't have a Magic wand or a glossy brochure full of hopes and promises to fix this issue. Nope - I deal in black and white. We can't afford to keep the current process and we surely can't afford spending more money. We need a culture shift. Government is the problem not the answer. It's more than a soap box statement and we can help others without draining our own limited resources.

I put the picture of work boots up to illustrate a barrier to employment for some. A good pair of work boots with the CSA green tag is a requirement of most factories. Some folks do not have the extra $100 laying around to get a pair, however, many working folks have an annual shoe allowance at work. Now imagine if folks used their shoe allowance and either donated their gently used pair or donated a new pair to the local Good Will or the Salvation Army. One pair of work boots used to get one person off Ontario Works saves likely $10,000 a year in direct benefit and administrative costs from the public purse and triples a person on social assistances' income even at a minimum wage job.

Whoa! - Pay off is much better than the builder subsidized Affordable Housing programs. Imagine the impact a union could have doing a work boot drive! One simple act saving our tax dollars and giving a hand up not a hand out!

Which brings me to my next point. Who do you donate gently used clothing and goods to? I get the calls from the Diabetes and others asking to donate clothes to them and they will even pick them up. This is the new source of income for charities. They pay a private firm to pick them up. They pay a private firm to call you. They then take the clothes to a private company - either ValueVillage or Talize and get paid by the pound. Some of those drop boxes at the local grocery stores are also private firms that donate a portion of their profits back to charities. The US family that owns Value Village is in the top 300 of the richest families in the USA. They provide a valuable service and have a great business model and I love shopping there. The volumes they turn over gives millions of dollars to charities so I do not begrudge their wealth. However - If you want to maximize the money your donation of goods is worth locally, drop your resellable goods in a Salvation Army or Good Will box or depot. 100% of the money stays with their organization when they sell that shirt you don't need anymore. 

Here is the Math portion - One bag of gently used clothes likely nets the Value Village selected charity about $20 - After they pay the private operators, take out their own administrative portion maybe $5 is left for programs and research.

However - donating that same bag to the Good Will, Salvation Army, Bibles for Missions, or St Vincent De Paul it will create around $100 that can go to programing and direct jobs. The Toronto Star did a series on this last year if you want another source. Setting that same bag as trash out to the curb will cost you $1.50 so you can free up some closet space, support a local charity and if you happen to shop at one of these places, you save the HST on top of the savings of buying gently used. Win - Win - Win!

Be selective about what you donate though. Glassware - malfunctioning or worn out appliances, some furniture especially upholstered items require the charity to pay to have them dumped. They are unsaleable especially if left out in the rain. Cribs, Mattresses - many baby items have regulations that prevent resale so you may want to call first. They may know of a person in need that will gladly take them.

I was telling Paul Holbrough and Ted Comiskey about my $2,000 coffee maker at the Food Bank challenge event. That is what we use to spend in a year at Tim Hortons. After several years of faithful use my under the counter coffee maker gave up this year. I was going to college on a Second Career program (I now have a Human Resource certificate with honours, my first college education at 51)  so I thought I'd go to Goodwill in Woodstock on my way home from Conestoga. Low and behold for $4.99 and no taxes, I got a newer version in excellent condition that fit right in my old brackets. Good Will got $5 and I saved probably $30. Another win,win.

Today's economy is not the dirty 30's {yet} -but it will never return to the hey days of the late 70's and 80's when a person fresh out of high school could walk in to any factory and get a good job and benefits and a pension. I think in the future we will be more like after WW2 - smaller houses, government support not hand outs, more reliance on service clubs and volunteers and neighbours. More goods inkind transactions rather than cheques and more charity events that return a value to the benefactors. I think it will be a good thing if we can get there. Our youth will be the first generation in a hundred years that do not have it better off than their parents. The sandwich generation (30's to 50's) will not see the benefits promised when Baby Boomers and their parents kick the bucket. We live way too long for the savings we have accumulated and we are an expensive lot to look after when we are old. We are spending your inheritance.  For the 20 somethings, don't kick us to the curb yet. Baby Boomers created this mess and have experiences and a duty that can help fix it. Besides you may need a place to move back to after college.

I apologize for the length of this post - If I had more time I'd make it shorter. Remember that this election is crucial to bring people power back to government. Vote for your Wallet and Please Vote!

Tim Lobzun