COCHRANE — Food bank demand is soaring in southern Alberta, as the area’s booming economy stares down a housing crunch.

In Cochrane alone, demand has jumped more than 26 per cent from July 2013 to June 2014 — and the number of children being fed by hampers is up almost 43 per cent.

“We’re really busy lately,” says Ann Beatty, who runs Cochrane Activettes’ food bank. “We’re definitely seeing an increase,”

With limited housing across the Calgary area, families are buying and renting beyond their means while cutting back on essentials.

Calgary’s food bank has seen a 10-per-cent hike in demand, while Airdrie’s food bank reports 24 per cent more usage, with 34 per cent more children.

“There’s not a lot of housing in Calgary, so obviously people are moving outside of the city,” says Beatty, peering over a warehouse balcony as five women fold cardboard boxes and fill them with cans of food, diapers and toilet paper. “And we don’t have a lot of affordable housing in the town.”

While the community has stepped up to meet the higher demand, Beatty expects requests to rise.

Big-box stores have set up shop, offering minimum-wage jobs in a town with no affordable housing. Multiple families are splitting houses, while some live in their cars or set up tents in relatives’ backyards.

“It’s not just housing for low-income people,” says Beatty, who recalls her son’s struggle to find a place to live. “He really had to jump at it the same day, and the realtor was getting calls as he signed the contract.”

Across town from the warehouse, past the hotels and many restaurants, sits the Family and Community Support Services (FCSS) office, which administers the Activettes’ food hampers.

Census data lists tourist-friendly Cochrane as one of the fastest growing municipalities in Canada. FCSS staff say while some newcomers only move for work, others want to build a life amid Cochrane’s small-town feel.

“A lot of people do come here thinking there’s a lot of work, and find that housing is a big problem,” says FCSS head Susan Flowers. She says that some new families arrive with social needs, but many are gainfully employed and can’t find a place to live without eating into living expenses.

From April 2013 to March 2014, front-desk staff logged 570 requests for affordable housing, defined as 10 per cent lower than market rates.

“It’s a patchwork kind of approach and often times they come up with nothing,” says Annemarie Tocher, FCSS resource co-ordinator. “That’s extremely difficult for the people who are looking, and for the worker when they’re not able to help people.”

Programs like subsidized cars and child care have seen a third more clients in the past year, she says.

The FCSS office sits on the ground floor of the town’s first affordable housing project, a 21-unit apartment complex opened in April 2006. Flowers says it’s the last time in recent memory that all three levels of government pitched in to help low-income residents.

“We need the federal government and the provincial government to step up,” she says. “The grants are drying up but the need is rising.”