Established in 1970, Agincourt Community Services Association (ACSA) is a non-profit, multi-service agency that addresses issues ranging from systemic poverty to housing and homelessness to hunger. They do this by empowering children, youth, newcomers, individuals experiencing homelessness, and those living in underserved communities within Scarborough, to build a better tomorrow, together.
On March 21, 2022, ACSA officially introduced their new Food Centre, a warm and welcoming food bank that Scarborough residents facing food insecurity can turn to for support.
“We’re seeing approximately 700-800 households a week, or 10,000 visits per month,” says Lee Soda, Executive Director, ACSA. “The food bank started in the one office, which then spilled out into the hallway and eventually took over most of the community hub. With more and more clients accessing the service, the space became tight and no longer functional. A new space was desperately needed to accommodate the growth.”
One of Daily Bread Food Bank’s three-year strategic goals is to enable the resiliency and growth of our agency network through key partnerships and targeted investments in capacity and service support.
Through our Anchor Agency Program, we build relationships with high-volume member agencies that allow us to efficiently serve more clients in areas of deep need. It was through the support of this program, that ACSA was able to transform their 7,000 sq ft footprint into a fully accessible Food Centre for the community.
“Opening up this Food Centre has been a vision we’ve had for a very long time, and it wasn’t until Daily Bread Food Bank helped with the financial resources from their Anchor Agency Program funding that we could make it come to fruition,” said Soda. “We demonstrated that we could service a large number of food bank clients and house a large amount of food, and we’re privileged to help at a grassroots level.”
ACSA acts a bridge between the people who need help and those who can provide it by meeting people’s basic needs and helping them to work towards their goals, encouraging and promoting them to flourish and contribute to building strong, vibrant communities. They realized that many of the individuals who were using the services of the food bank could also use other programs and services that ACSA provides in the Scarborough community. They are then able to connect these clients to the supports they need in a holistic manner, focusing on their vision of “building a better tomorrow.”
We look forward to continuing to work with ACSA and other community organizations across Toronto to facilitate food access for everyone in our city.
