Heather Vanner is set to retire after 25 years as Executive Director of Community Resource Service.
Vanner joined the organization in 1999 and became the Executive Director just two years later. Last year, the City of Brantford declared a food bank insecurity crisis, and since 2021, the number of people using food banks has already risen by 76 percent, with no signs of slowing.
“The largest single increase in food bank use has happened over the past five years” said Vanner.
Adding to this, as wages have failed to keep up with the cost of living, more people have come to the organization for food and to seek jobs.
Driving down memory lane, the organization has grown from a single Clarence Street location with no warehouse to an 8,000-square-foot facility on Sherwood Drive. In addition to more staff members, two walk-in freezers, two cube trucks, and a refrigerated cooler, helping support over 1,200 households a month with more than a million pounds of food a year for families and individuals in need in the community.
Vanner said that correcting public misconceptions about how the food bank operates has been the biggest challenge of her career.
“Community Resource Service is an independent local charitable organization” said Vanner, explaining how they get very minimal amounts of funding from the city. She further added that the organization helps people with employment and emergency food assistance because most people accessing the food bank are in genuine need, either due to job loss, housing emergencies, or domestic violence, rather than taking advantage of the system.
Vanner believes economic issues, such as housing prices, minimum wages, and government policies, are the major contributors to food insecurity rather than food itself, and that these problems require changes beyond what a food bank can do.
Mandy Samwell, Ward Five Councillor for the City of Brantford, pointed out the same issues as Vanner, stating that the food insecurity is more of an income and affordability issue rather than a food access problem.
Samwell added that residents could expect more services, as the city is working with the Blessing Centre on a centralized food distribution plan and is also collaborating with “Hunger Has No Place Here” an initiative in partnership with the County of Brant and the Brant Food Systems Coalition.
Vanner said that, as she leaves, she believes the organization is in a much stronger position now, and that the next Executive Director, Beth Noble-Luciani, who is set to take over on Monday, August 10, 2026, will continue to lead the organization.
“I have no doubt she will lead the organization with a steady hand, focused on continued growth in community engagement, and on programs and services that will continue to support the clients we serve,” concluded Vanner.
