Tuesday December 2, 2025 | LANGFORD, BC [Latest update 5:55 pm December 3, 2025]
by Mary P Brooke | Island Social Trends
FortisBC executives and senior staff spent a chunk of today at the Goldstream Food Bank in Langford.
Together with City of Langford Mayor, councillors and several staff, the FortisBC contingent helped load donated food items onto shelves in the morning, and in the afternoon ‘shopped’ the shelves to fill hamper boxes made mobile in grocery shopping carts.
This was an event organized well in advance to take place on Giving Tuesday.
Giving Tuesday started in 2012 and has become a global generosity movement with the aim to ‘unleash the power of radical generosity’.
FortisBC participates in Giving Tuesday in three locations in BC each year.
Hard work:
This was no easy day! The hamper-assembly event lasted six hours, with teams of FortisBC and City of Langford representatives being guided by long-time Goldstream Food Bank organizers on how to pack a holiday hamper — two of this, one of that, only from the shelves on this side, push your cart here, stack your finished hamper there.
Holiday hampers will be prepared for about 800 families at the Goldstream Food Bank this year, over the course of several days.
“It’s a lot of food, it’s a lot of work,” said Gayle Ireland who runs the Goldstream Food Bank. She emphasized the essential importance of volunteers helping with the holiday hampers and the food bank year-round.
The hampers include non-perishable foods as well as each hamper recipient also being given a gift card for the purchase of meat and produce at a local grocery outlet.
The hampers are “for people who are struggling”, said Darrell, one of the lead organizers of the food bank. He itemized that as “parents who are working hard to make ends meet, seniors on fixed incomes, and children who deserve healthy meals”.
Year-end load:
A lot of food comes in during the holiday season including from community food drives (by schools and other organizations) as well as retailers.
By the third week of December over 1,500 boxes will also have been assembled by the seasonal volunteers (folks donating their time from businesses and organizations) for provision to families in the new year — possibly lasting up to May or June.
Year-round there are about 90 regular volunteers at the food bank.
“We can always do better,” says the Goldstream Food Bank, outlining some of the organizational improvements that have been made over the years. Some of those evolutionary steps have included asking community donors to pre-sort the food they collect (by product type and best-before date).
Dignity and hope:
“Your contribution helps us provide not just food but dignity and hope,” said Goldstream Food Bank volunteer leader Walter.
“Together we are building a stronger more caring community and we look forward to continuing this relationship in the future,” the food bank rep said about how the City of Langford brought FortisBC to the table to support the food bank.
Over the years the range of food items and other supportive items like toiletries has expanded, to provide as much meaningful support as possible.
Regular hampers:
Outside of the Christmas holiday season, about 500 families are normally supported by the Goldstream Food Bank every month.
The regular monthly hampers include meat, eggs and dairy in addition to the wide range of non-perishable food products and toiletry items.
FortisBC premises upgrade donation:
Food safety and freshness of the produce and dairy that is stored on-site at the food bank was boosted by FortisBC’s contribution of $30,000 for the rehabilitation of the old walk-in fridge and freezer which — having been first installed in 1999 — had worn out and required upgrading.
That refrigerator and freezer work was done in the summer, to ensure that greater holiday season capacity could be achieved as well as assuring better food quality year-round.
Ireland said that if the food bank had to have spent its own funds in the amount of $30,000 that the fridge/freezer upgrade would have equated to $45,000 in food-purchase value.
“You’ve helped a lot of people by providing us that grant and that money,” said Ireland to the FortisBC CEO Roger Dall’Antonia and VP of Indigenous Relations and Regularity Affairs, and other FortisBC team members who attended — including public affairs and community leads Diana Sorace, Carmen Driechel, and Raisa Frenette — with about 30 folks in the FortisBC contingent attending in total.
FortisBC CEO:
FortisBC CEO Roger Dall’Antonia took part in the shelf stocking and hamper packing, and over a noon-hour break delivered some remarks to about 60 people who gathered for the event on the main level of the Langford Legion (the food bank is below on the lower level).
Dall’Antonia’s remarks were of course about supporting those in need, given the setting and the theme of the day. But he more deeply expressed the philosophy of the FortisBC gas and electric utility in a way that showed true colours about a company that operates with the full belief of being part of the communities they serve and giving back within those communities.
FortisBC has an office in Langford, as well as one in the Vancouver lower mainland area one one in the BC Interior. The utility has about 2,700 employees. With its delivery of critical infrastructure FortisBC serves homes and businesses in 135 municipal communities and 58 Indigenous communities.
Dall’Antonia said he feels that Langford “truly understands the power of community — you can see that today”. He noted how Langford is a fast-growing community “which creates a lot of strain”.
Dall’Antonia told Island Social Trends that he sees the need for improvements to the economy — to address the economic challenges that are holding back improvements in affordability. He believes the economy is in a downturn due to a combination of factors: post-pandemic recovery, supply chain interruptions, geopolitical instability, and higher input costs. “It’s a layering of impacts,” said Dall’Antonia.
Dall’Antonia appreciates the BC government’s Look West economic initiative to “harness the capabilities of our province”. He says that BC has a skilled and educated workforce. He itemized some projects that will help the economy such as Site C and LNG Canada as part of energy security where he feels investment is rightly focussed.
Langford Mayor:
Langford Mayor Scott Goodmanson delivered remarks at today’s event. He noted how the Goldstream Food Bank, FortisBC and the City of Langford all working together is allowing us to “get a great amount of work done today and a very generous $30,000 that FortisBC has given toward the fridge and freezers.
Langford is the second-fastest growing city in BC. “We need supports… the higher your population, the more people are going to need food,” said Goodmanson. This is seen across the country as demand on food banks continues to steadily increase due to affordability challenges.
People are lined up and waiting to get in, he remarked about demand at the Goldstream Food Bank. “What we are doing here makes a significant difference,” said Goodmanson.
Goodmanson boasted some ‘quick math’ in figuring that handing out 130 hampers per day over the course of four hours means that each client is served in less than 1 minute 50 seconds during the course of regular monthly operations at the Goldstream Food Bank.
Attending today with Mayor Goodmanson were City Councillors Kimberley Guiry, Colby Harder, Lillian Szpak and Mary Wagner. Also participating at the food bank event today were the Senior Manager of Communications & Economic Development Donna Petrie, Communications Advisor Harriet D’Costa, and Director of Engineering Kate Balzer.
Langford donation:
The City of Langford today officially donated $5,092.25 to the Goldstream Food Bank.
The majority of the funds came from a recent film shoot done in Langford (even though film location fees aren’t charged very often) – when there’s opportunity to do so it’s an opportunity to forward it directly to the food bank. “That keeps the money circulating in the community for the greater good,” said Petrie.
Of the donation, $800 was generated by way of the annual Show & Shine outdoor card show event held in Langford this past summer.
===== RELATED:
- FortisBC CEO on energy service reliability, sustainability and innovation (September 9, 2025)
- Goldstream Food Bank gets a facelift with FortisBC donation (August 11, 2025)
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