Vegan Food Event Is Shut Down At Brock University

By Tayler Staneff

The halls of Brock University are often filled with student groups fundraising by selling baked goods and other foods to raise money for a certain cause. Walk through MCA Block on any given day and you are bound to see some sort of bake sale or food giveaway.

A scene from a past vegan food event at Brock University, before the bust.

Students line up to purchase vanilla cupcakes and other ‘goodies’… but doesn’t anyone stop and ask, “Where are the hand washing stations?

This is the reality that the Brock Animal Rights Club (BARC) was faced with this past Monday, March 14 during their annual Vegan Taco Day. BARC’s annual vegan taco day has been a huge success for the past five years, bringing line-ups of people to enjoy a cruelty free lunch. This March 14, BARC was at it again, promoting compassionate food choices by handing out free vegan tacos to anyone interested in trying one.
BARC has always distributed quality food in a health conscious and appropriate manner, using gloves, separate spoons and napkins etc. Although this is almost unnecessary due to the lack of animal products and therefore, lack of contamination issues, BARC has always strived to handle the food served in appropriate measures.

Walking through the hallway bake sales, I have never once, seen a table with a “hand-washing station” and rarely see gloves being used. However, BARC’s Vegan Taco Day fells victim to scrutiny this March 14 when the Niagara Health Board showed up saying they received a complaint about the fundraiser. Apparently, someone called in and complained that they did not have the cheese refrigerated (it was non-dairy, so there was no need) and they didn’t have a hand-washing station.
Clearly, there is a double standard happening from one fundraiser to the next. In this case, every single bake sale must have their baked goods refrigerated, everyone must be wearing gloves and hairnets, and there must be at least one hand-washing station available.
If Brock, Sodexo and the Niagara Health Board would like to work together to implement guidelines for on campus food fundraising, BARC is all for it. However, if we are going to be singled out and held to a standard that no other campus group is held to, this is an issue.
Was this really a concern over health board regulations or was this based on what the taco day promoted?
If it really was over a health concern, why is the Niagara Health Board not called on a daily basis for every bake sale? Was the call simply made because someone can’t stand the idea of animal rights and veganism? Was this really about health or was this an issue over lost profits from other food services on campus? I wonder if this had anything to do with Union Station’s “Taco Tuesday” being held the same afternoon.

To the individual, or group of individuals, who called the Niagara Health Board and made a complaint about BARC’s annual Vegan Taco Day, I say thank you, for only furthering the point that veganism is frowned upon and discriminated against on campus.
Tayler Staneff is a Niagara resident and member of Niagara Action for Animals and the Brock Animal Rights Club.

Niagara At Large contacted Niagara Region’s health department over this matter and Bill Hunter, a manager in the department, was quick to get back to say that from the department’s standpoint, the decision to shut down BARC’s vegan taco event had nothing to do with discriminating again that group or any other.
Someone called the department about the event and an inspector simply went out to make sure, as the department does with as food handlers as possible across the region, that proper steps are being taken to address “cross contamination” or any “food-borne disease.”
Hunter said the department has since contacted the university to advise them that the same standards should be applied to all groups distributing food on the campus. The department was “certainly not discriminating against BARC, he said, and has already advised the group that it would be happy to discuss in advance what steps it should take with respect to sanitizaton, etc. to hold its event.
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