By Jack Brittle, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter
The Gift of Giving Back (GOGB) was founded as the Eagles Food Drive in 2005 by Jean Longfield as a way to teach her kids about the privilege that they had compared to other children.
Twenty years later, the organization has expanded across multiple youth teams and recently hired its first employee. And in August, a flag-raising ceremony was held at City Hall to declare September “GOGB Month” in Burlington.
Debbie Wende, managing director, said that the City of Burlington is “very supportive” of the GOGB. Representatives from other Burlington non-profits were also in attendance at the flag-raising, including Krista Kay and Robin Bailey of Feed Halton and O’neil Edwards, executive director of the Compassion Society. The ceremony represented the kick-off of GOGB’s fall campaign.
Longfield spoke about what the 20th anniversary of GOGB means to her.
“It’s absolutely thrilling because I look back on those 20 years and I think about all the kids that we’ve worked with and how they’ve experienced the Gift,” Longfield said. “And then I look back at all of the beneficiaries and families that we’ve helped in Burlington, it’s a staggering number. So it’s a really great feel-good story. We’ve accomplished a lot in 20 years.”
Longfield said that many parents who participated in GOGB as young athletes are now introducing their children to the program.
“I think they’re more excited about it than the kids sometimes,” Longfield said.
To Longfield, GOGB is less a food drive and more of a feeling.
“We’re teaching the kids,” Longfield said. “It’s getting them involved in something that hugely impacts the community. Kids can be amazing change makers if they’re given the chance and the structure to make that happen, and they fully embrace it.”
Wende spoke about what the group’s plans are for celebrating the anniversary.
“We’re increasing our awareness,” Wende said. “We’ve launched a new newsletter. We’re doing some stuff on our social media feed, as well as updating our website.”
Wende said that they are planning events that look both back and forward.
“[We will be] bringing out some old photos where we’ve gone, starting back with Jean, even before it was a registered charity,” Wende said. “[When she was] having her kids walk around the neighbourhood with little red wagons, collecting food and taking them to the food bank.”
Wende said that they will also have more recent photos celebrating the progress of the group.
GOGB held this year’s Oakville Food Drive at Holy Trinity Catholic School and will be holding its Burlington drive from December 2–3 at Nelson High School.
Wende said they are hoping to make the Nelson event a “bigger community event.” There are also plans to have another event in the spring to celebrate 2025’s accomplishments. In their 20th year and into the future, GOGB is also hoping to expand into other sports beyond hockey, including baseball, soccer, rugby, and lacrosse.
Wende became involved in the group after her father passed away. Her daughter was playing for the Burlington Barracudas, and Wende had just left her job to have time and space to grieve for her father.
“The Barracudas had put out a note saying, ‘We really need someone to come and help volunteer and coordinate a little bit more,’” Wende said. “So I thought to myself, I’ve got some extra time that I usually don’t have, and it just really struck me as something that I could put my energy into at the time.”
Wende credits their work for the GOGB with bringing her and her daughter closer together.
“It’s something that she and I share very closely, and it means a lot to both of us,” Wende said.
Other GOGB parents also find that the organization allows them to live their values alongside their children. Ai-Ri Brown, a GOGB board member, said that the organization naturally aligned with her parenting goal.
“My life mission is to raise kids who are socially minded, responsible, compassionate, and empathetic,” Brown said.
“I’m an immigrant, my parents were immigrants,” Brown continued. “I came here with nothing. We struggled when I was little, and we are very privileged to be living here. And I see my kids and the way they have stuff, they are very privileged — not as privileged as others, but in my eyes, from my upbringing, [still privileged]. And I didn’t want them to lose sight of other people.”
Longfield said that the idea for GOGB came about when she realized how expensive it is for kids to play hockey. Longfield is also an immigrant to Canada and wanted her kids to appreciate how privileged they were to play organized sports.
“We settled on this thing where we were going to take a couple of little red wagons through a neighbourhood,” Longfield said. “They were running up to the doors, ringing the bells, and they were saying how wonderful it was; the kids loved it.”
Longfield says that youth sports are not just about athletics, but “ developing [kids] as people and as good citizens.”
John Crick, director of operations, said that the implementation of the Burlington-based tap-payment tool Tiptap has greatly helped GOGB from a financial perspective.
“It’s allowed us to put some money towards some professional help, but more importantly, the food banks love money,” Crick said. “Because then they have the buying power. They may have five tons of canned beans, but they don’t have any tuna. So this gives them the opportunity to go and buy what they need. We basically take the money we collect, and once a year, we hand it over to the various beneficiaries.”
GOGB works with the Burlington Eagles, Barracudas, and Lions Optimist Minor Hockey Association, as well as with the Oakville Rangers and Hornets.
Their beneficiaries include the Salvation Army, Food for Life, The Compassion Society, Burlington Food Bank, the Halton Catholic Children’s Foundation, and the Halton Learning Foundation.
Some of these organizations also host tours of their facilities for the players, which Longfield says aligns with one of the group’s goals.
“One of our founding principles is for our kids to get to know these agencies,” Longfield said. “So as they grow, they will know that places like this must be supported. They get to know the people in all of our beneficiaries because we have them at the meetings, and they come to the drives.”
Crick also spoke about the effect that Feed Halton has had on their organization.
“It’s been a huge benefit to us,” Crick said. “Because at the end of our Burlington Food Drive, we have probably four tractor-trailer loads of food. The problem before [food distribution hub] Feed Halton was that this tractor-trailer would go to a place that may not have a good facility for offloading it, but that was the only place it could go.”
“But more importantly, they oftentimes end up with far too much of one thing and not enough of another,” Crick continued. “So with the central repository, not only did we have material handling and the docks here to take all the food, we only send trucks to one place, they’re offloaded, and then it’s distributed as needed.”
At the end of each food drive, children from each team involved will meet in the gym of the designated school and fill it with all of the food collected.
Wende spoke about the effect that this final culmination has on the kids.
“There are a lot of people who say, ‘Well, why don’t you just collect money? That would make it easier.’” Wende said. “Or ‘We’ll just drop off stuff here and there, and it’s not really a big deal if it makes it to the big event.’ [But] that’s really the exact opposite of what we’re trying to accomplish. Because the big spectacle is what the kids feel. They see all of that stuff in one location, and it makes such an impact.”
Crick said that GOGB has become such an integral part of the food collection process in Burlington that abandoning it would be “unthinkable.”
“It’s just impossible to let go of it,” Crick said. “Not only because you shouldn’t, but because you can’t. It’s just become part of our lives.”
Longfield explained what she would like to see from the GOGB over the next 20 years.
“I would hope it would grow,” Longfield said. “In my mind, I think that this successful campaign could be applied anywhere in the country, and it could fill every food bank in our nation. I think the idea of kindness and compassion for others is extremely important in this day and age.”
Wende said that she would also like to see the group expand to other areas in Halton, like Milton, Halton Hills, and Georgetown, as well as other youth sports organizations. Part of the thinking to involve other sports in the organization is to make the GOGB less seasonal, Crick explained.
“There are a number of areas that we need to push so that the collections continue throughout the year, not just November and December,” Crick said. “We have baseball now. It’s in its infancy, and every year it’s getting better. But baseball has the potential to be as big as hockey; it’s just going to take time.”
Longfield feels that there is an “intolerance” creeping into our society, and hopes that the “Gift,” as she calls it, can help combat it.
“I would hope that the messages of the Gift resonate with a lot of young people who are looking to do good work and have compassion and kindness for people who need it,” Longfield said. “I would hope that it grows, that other communities embrace it, and that kids continue to have fun with it.”
To donate to the Gift of Giving Back, click here to head to their website.
