OTTAWA - It's something Bertha Darling sees more of each month, especially after the Christmas season.
The manager of Metro's Food Depot Alimentaire said individuals and families, homeowners and people with jobs are suddenly forced to rely on food banks in order to make ends meet each month.
Thanks to rising home heating costs and with the cost of gasoline projected to continue to rise in the coming months, Darling said it's becoming harder for the province's working class to provide for themselves and their families.
The pressure is especially tight after the Christmas season, when families may have had to choose between paying a bill and buying a gift for their child.
While food bank usage in the province is down slightly, Darling said usage of soup kitchens and emergency food deliveries is on the rise.
She's still calculating numbers, but she said a new segment of "working poor" is growing.
"They need the services to be able to get the bread and sandwich meats to bring to work for lunches," she said. "They don't want to be on social assistance, but don't work enough hours. When you're working minimum wage, you can't put a roof over your head, pay electricity, phone and have money for food -- it's just impossible."
New Brunswick's food bank users had the highest level of home ownership across the country, according to the Canadian Food Bank Association.
Fifteen per cent of the 16,000 New Brunswickers who visited food banks last March owned their own homes, a startling trend pointing to the changing face of poverty in the region.
Nearly 11 per cent of food bank users hold jobs.
The Moncton depot is used as a distribution centre for 23 food agencies in southeastern New Brunswick and from June 2006 to July 2007, distributed 1,613, 825 pounds of food. "We're still feeding a lot of people," said Darling.
She said many of these people aren't considered "poor" by the government and therefore don't qualify for things like social assistance.
From January to September, the food bank helped 20,567 families and 25,205 children.
The national food bank association pegs the decrease in food bank use in the province as a result of a demand for workers in call centers, the service industry, construction and grocery chains.
"We're still seeing more people coming who have employment income, people who have fixed income and seniors on old age pension and people on disability pensions," said Canadian Association of Food Banks spokeswoman Katharine Schmidt.
While government and the private sector have increased the number of families in subsidized housing, the demand continues to rise above supply.
Darling said the cost of housing still makes it difficult for those with low incomes, and especially those on social assistance, to acquire suitable housing. "There are a lot of people who say they never thought they'd have to ask for food from a food bank," she said.
"If you're renting an apartment for example, and not on social assistance, you don't get that extra help. If you're working and don't want to be part of that, it's terribly hard so you're going to food banks asking for help -- it's a vicious cycle."
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