Food security initiatives in Yorkton receive donation over $30,000

Yorkton, Sask. -

Legacy Co-op Yorkton Food Centre raised $33,871 from their 2023 Good Buy to Hunger fundraiser.

In celebration of reaching their goal, members from the community came out on Wednesday to watch managers from the store get pied to their faces by employees. For every $10,000 that was raised, one store manager would be pied.

"It's important for us to be part of the community and to support all different organizations within the community,” Harley McClughan, general manager at Legacy Co-op, said after being pied.

"At Christmas time, which is when most of this promotion is going on, it was important to make sure that those in need were able to have something."

The annual fundraiser took place during the month of December. From the amount raised, Co-op was able to donate to four local organizations – Bruno’s Place, Soup Haven, Shelwin House and the Salvation Army.

Angela Chernoff, coordinator for Bruno’s Place said the donation will help fund the shelter for the remainder of their fiscal year.

"Anything like this helps us just to serve the community that we serve in a better way,” said Chernoff.

• Get the CTV News app for Saskatchewan breaking news alerts and top stories 

"This really allows us to feed more people. We recently increased our beds from 10 to 15 and then now they're actually at 20. We've had no increase in our grocery budget through that change so this will help us to finish off the fiscal year which for us is the end of March."

Since the fundraiser has started, Legacy Co-op in Yorkton has raised approximately $150,000, donating all of its proceeds back to those in need in the community.

They will be presenting donations to food security initiatives in Kamsack and Churchbridge next.

McClughan also mentioned that the campaign will be running again in December.