One hundred and ten neighbours and two staff.
The truck comes Tuesday at nine. Sorting is Wednesday. Distribution is Tuesday, Thursday evening and Saturday morning. Drivers do the Friday grocery-store route. Every shift is listed with the places open, including the full ones, so you can see the whole week.
The truck
Three Rivers Food Bank delivers on Tuesday mornings: pallets down the ramp, boxes onto the shelves, the cold room filled first. It is the most physical shift — boxes up to forty pounds — and the one that makes the rest of the week possible. Receiving volunteers are done by eleven and the doors open at noon.
This week’s shifts
Mondays
Tuesdays
Wednesdays
Thursdays
Fridays
Saturdays
Saturday 21 November
A full shift stays on the list on purpose: it shows the week as it is, and staff keep a list of people who want in when a place opens.
Five things every volunteer agrees to
The pantry never photographs the people who come for food, and volunteers agree not to either — every picture on this site is of shelves, crates, the truck and the room before opening. The desk sheet lists household sizes, not names, and it goes in the safe at closing.
Pick a shift
A name, a way to reach you, and a shift. Under eighteen is fine with an adult on the same shift. Demonstration: it sends nothing and stores nothing.
What happens next
Within two days the operations coordinator emails or texts back: your place is held, and the date of the next twenty-minute food-safety briefing, which happens at the start of your first shift.
If the shift is full, you are on the list for it and offered the nearest open one; most people who ask for Saturday end up loving Tuesday receiving.
Drivers are asked for their licence and a driving-record check before the first route, done through the pantry’s insurer’s own form — never through this website.
Groups of six or more (a team, a class, a congregation) should email first so a shift can be set aside.
This is the sample pantry’s practice, written for the demonstration. A real pantry’s rules for volunteers come from its own policy, its food bank and its insurer; this page reports a practice, it does not advise one.