$100,000 goes to the SAMU food bank

Hampers at the campus food bank will be getting a major top-up after MacEwan gave the SAMU Pantry a contribution of $100,000 this week.

The money comes from MacEwan’s in-year surplus allocation. These are unspent funds leftover from the operating budget that can be funneled into other initiatives. During tuition negotiations, SAMU asked for some of that money to go to the Pantry. 

“Over the past few months, MacEwan has worked closely with SAMU to understand student needs and find ways to provide support this year.” MacEwan president Annette Trimbee said to the Griff in an email. “Yesterday, MacEwan provided a $100,000 contribution to the food pantry.”

At a time where food banks in Edmonton are seeing exceptionally high demand, and donations aren’t keeping up, this one-time check helps take some pressure off of MacEwan’s only campus food bank. 

In November, the Griff reported the food bank was struggling to keep up with demand, as usage has skyrocketed more than 300 per cent over the past five years. New funding will help ease some of the pressure.

In January, 236 students used the Pantry services, with 52 of them using it for the very first time. In the first two months of 2025, the main reasons self-reported by students were being unemployed international students, followed by cost of food and high cost of living. 

Annette Kelm, SAMU’s student services manager who oversees the Pantry, says it’s her goal to stretch this money as far as it can go. For her, the results are simple.

“Being able to support more students,” she says. “Currently, we’re kind of at a cap. With more money, we can serve more because students are hungry.”’

She adds that some of the money will also help fill holes in the service, like getting more culturally relevant food for students. 

SAMU says the contribution is an example of advocacy paying off. 

“It’s a really big win for students,” says SAMU vice-president (student life) Aleace Moom, adding that one of the biggest concerns among students, according to SAMU’s student surveys, is affordability. 

These sorts of in-year surplus allocations represent a bigger shift in the relationship between SAMU and MacEwan. SAMU President Gabriel Ambutong says it’s “momentous.”

“The fact that we have these different avenues now that exist, that have been established, means that future years are more likely to be fruitful based on what our executives were able to accomplish this year,” Ambutong says.

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Photo by Amanda Erickson