By Gabriella Payne
The Cockatoo Community have gone above and beyond in the last week to ensure no one in need will be left to go hungry, as food donations for the communal pantry have continued to come flying in left, right and centre.
Tamsin Brook, the project coordinator behind Cockatoo’s ‘Foodisfree’ initiative, said that there had been a “massive” response from the local community since the storm and when she went to collect the donation baskets set up at the local IGA on Thursday 17 June, she was brought to tears by the outpouring of kindness.
“I was a bit overwhelmed when I went down there [to collect the donations], because the baskets were overflowing with food,” Ms Brook said.
“The Cockatoo community are typically quite generous anyway,” she explained, but said that it had filled her “with great pride” to see everyone in the community looking after one another in this way.
“I think it’s one of those things; Cockatoo wasn’t that badly hit compared to other places [by the storm], but because we are a part of the hills community, we’re always thinking, ‘what can we do to help our hills neighbours?’,” Ms Brook said.
“So something like this lets people feel like they’re helping and they really are, it’s just great to see.”
All the donations collected from the IGA have helped fill the communal ‘Foodisfree’ pantry at the Cockatoo Community House for now, and Ms Brook said that a lot of food would be sent “up the hill” to help the communities really struggling after the storm.
“We’ve had such a great response that we’ll be giving three crates of collected food to the Emerald SES to donate to our friends up the hill,” she said.
“They’ve organised a drop off point at the Cockatoo RSL, specifically for this purpose on the back of [Cardinia Shire] council saying no to providing one.”
While non-perishable items were preferred, the ‘Foodisfree’ initiative are accepting any and all donations, which Ms Brook said would help make a difference for those doing it tough right now.
The owner of the Cockatoo IGA, Nathan Pasco, said that having the donation baskets set up at the supermarket was the least he could do to help the community in these difficult times.
“It’s a small thing we can do to help,” Mr Pasco said.
“It’s taken a while to get going, but we got the baskets up on Tuesday morning and they were filled by Thursday.
We’re grateful to be able to contribute, but we see it as a small thing on our behalf, because it’s the people that are helping each other and we’re just happy to be the vehicle for it,” he said.
Mr Pasco said that they intended to keep the donation baskets around for as long as people needed them.
You can find the ‘Foodisfree’ pantry on the porch of the Cockatoo Community House, located at 23 Bailey Road, Cockatoo.
