Due to an increased use of services at Chalmers Community Services Centre, it will temporarily close on Mondays.
It was a very hard decision for us to make to temporarily close, said Sarah Meunier, executive director of Chalmers.
Chalmers at 41 Macdonell St. runs a café along with a food pantry throughout the week. The café offers a space for people to socialize, relax and enjoy coffee, tea and snacks for free. The pantry provides vegetables, fruit, canned goods and hygiene products.
The café will be closed Mondays starting May 6 but will be open Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Fridays at the Macdonell Street location. It will also be open on Thursdays at 577 Willow Rd. at the Three Willows United Church.
The pantry will not be impacted by the temporary closure.
Typically the café sees 10 to 15 people on Mondays but currently numbers are up to 20.
“So what we can see is more Guelphites need support. And because we are open to anyone and easily accessible, people turn to us for food,” said Meunier.
Chalmers can’t keep up with the increased need of people accessing services for food.
Since the increase is becoming a regular occurrence Meunier calls it an exceptional event that “brings a lot of challenges for our guests, of course, and also for our organization because poverty issues are on the rise for Guelph.”
The consequence of this is pressure on the organization to find more funding and creating enough capacity of staff and volunteers.
She realizes many other organizations are in similar situations to Chalmers.
“So we need more funds to ensure we can offer this vital service,” she said. Chalmers also needs to reorganize its service so it can continue to help people.
Meunier became executive director in November. She became a volunteer for Chalmers when she moved to Guelph in 2023. She noticed an increased demand since she started as executive director.
What drew her to Chalmers was the café and the fact services are free for clients.
In 2023, 60 per cent of Chalmers clients were children. Last week, Chalmers had 569 visits from clients for the pantry. In February, it almost doubled the amount of people served at the food pantry. There were 2,084 people served in February and 1,182 people served in February last year.
Last year Chalmers saw an increase of 18 per cent in client visits. It also saw 889 new guests, an increase of 59 per cent over 2022.
Meunier hopes Chalmers will open on Mondays again during the summer.
In the meantime, people are welcomed to donate monetarily or donate pantry items like canned vegetables, rice, pasta, tea, diapers, baby formula, etc.
People are welcomed to come to the café on the other days it is open during the week.
