Mayor, councillors compete for Calgary Food Bank — and an unusual trophy

Calgary city councillors are going head-to-head for a good cause for the second annual Councillor’s Challenge Thursday morning.

The mayor’s annual food drive is now on it’s 35th year, but it wasn’t until last year that a new tradition was formed — councillors competing against one another for a chance to hoist the Golden Lettuce — a championship trophy made of brass and shaped like a head of iceberg lettuce.

“It’s important for us to come together in the spirit of community and really help out people that are in need this year,” Mayor Jyoti Gondek told CityNews. “This year’s a particularly tough one.”

It’s underway!

For the second year in a row, the councillors challenge is in full swing here in #Calgary

City councillors are racing against each other to collect food for the food bank

Bragging rights and the coveted golden lettuce are on the line… pic.twitter.com/Wk4yS3AOOG

— Logan Stein (@L0ganStein) November 30, 2023

City councillors collect food and donations, starting with two 15-minutes heats Thursday morning, to fill as many bags as possible with specific food items and supplies.

Team scores are tallied by the weight of the bags, with the winning team getting a head start in the challenge.

Though participants are vying for that unique trophy, the real prize, they say, is being able to help their neighbours.

Melissa Fromm with the food bank says, many people are in need of the help.

“We look back a year ago, we were feeding about 400-450 households a day,” she explained. “Today we’ll have as many as 700 households coming through the Calgary Food Bank looking for food support and that just really speaks to a lot of different things all culminating together to create the situation that we’re in.”

Fromm adds, the level of need is unprecedented.

“We’ve seen a 34 per cent year over year increase in the number folks who are working and simply cannot make ends meet,” she said. “That’s folks that are going out every day, they’ve got a job, they’re doing their best to get by and they just can’t do it.”

Last year’s winning councillor was Ward 5’s Raj Dhaliwal who collected nearly $20,000 worth of food and donations for the food bank.

Gondek says the food drive in a perfect example of working together for the common good.

“I think this year’s councillor’s challenge at the food bank is a great way to kick off that community spirit. I’m really grateful to my council colleagues and their teams in their offices for banding together in this matter and really setting the tone for what we can do when we work together.”

This challenge runs for 11 days, before a winner is crowned on Dec. 10.