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Bob's Vision
Chiarelli to Create Endowment Fund to Ensure
No Child in Ottawa Goes to School Hungry
OTTAWA, October 26, 2006 – Today, Mayor Bob Chiarelli announced his plan to establish an endowment fund to ensure Ottawa’s School Breakfast Program receives secure funding.
“I think we would all agree that we want to live in a city where no child goes to school hungry,” said Mayor Chiarelli. “To ensure every child in Ottawa has the opportunity to succeed in school and to develop the skills they need to contribute to our community, they have to start each day with a healthy breakfast.
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Currently, the School Breakfast Program which is run through a community and business partnership led by the Ottawa Centre for Research and Innovation (OCRI), serves more than a million breakfasts annually to 8,200 students at 127 elementary and secondary schools in the region. However, as more children in need are identified in the community, the funding needed to see the program meet its demands also increases.
Under the Mayor’s plan, the City would match every dollar contributed by the private sector—up to $1,000,000 over four years. This increase in funding will give this program the capacity to reach out to more than 10,000 children in need, each year. Under the current funding formula the program remains vulnerable to the ups and downs of fundraising. This new matching funding will help stabilize the revenue stream so the program can reach out to more children in need.
“The School Breakfast Program must undertake a fundraising campaign every year to get the bulk of its funding. And every year the number of participating schools and students increase. These twin pressures produce an unnecessary financial burden on this valuable program, It’s time to put an end to this uncertainty with stable funding,” said Mayor Chiarelli.
Currently, this vital program is supported by over 16 partner organizations, including the City of Ottawa; but unfortunately, it struggles each year to secure the approximately $1million in annual funding needed for its continued success. The United Way/Centraide Ottawa and Governments provide funding for Breakfast Monitors, with a current City contribution of $70,000 annually that OCRI effectively leverage other sources of revenue. In addition, the City of Ottawa has an Ottawa Public Health Official sit on OCRI’s Steering Committee to provide nutritional training to schools delivering the breakfasts.
“Our city is growing and we need to make sure that our community programs can keep up
with that growth,” said Mayor Chiarelli. “This is the type of innovative partnership that the City of Ottawa needs to nurture to ensure it can sustain the expanding needs of going from a big little city to a little big city.”
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