{"id":441143,"date":"2026-05-23T05:21:08","date_gmt":"2026-05-23T05:21:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/441143\/"},"modified":"2026-05-23T05:21:08","modified_gmt":"2026-05-23T05:21:08","slug":"thief-takes-wheelbarrow-full-of-food-and-tools-from-thames-charity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/441143\/","title":{"rendered":"Thief takes wheelbarrow full of food and tools from Thames charity"},"content":{"rendered":"
\u201cWe are so sorry to our families in our schools and communities that we have told food is coming. We won\u2019t have the time or the space to catch up so they will miss out.\u201d<\/p>\n
Food packages are delivered to pensioners, schools and families in need.<\/p>\n
The door to Aotearoa Disaster and Community Resources based in Totara, Thames, was forced open by a thief.<\/p>\n
The volunteer team came to work on Wednesday morning to find the latch of the door broken, with several items including tools and food missing from inside.<\/p>\n
Items included a leaf blower, concrete drill, chocolates and V energy drinks.<\/p>\n
The neighbouring Totara property had CCTV cameras that captured the person breaking and entering.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe saw a wheelbarrow in the video and then another neighbour told us their wheelbarrow was stolen so we put two and two together.\u201d<\/p>\n
Police confirmed to the Herald they were aware of the incident.<\/p>\n
\u201cPolice have received a report of a burglary at a storage shed on Ngati Maru Highway, Thames, which was reported on May 20. The information provided is being assessed. A forensic examination has been carried out.\u201d<\/p>\n
ADCR has since installed cameras and an alarm on the inside of the building, which Brockbank said has meant they can no longer afford a fence they planned to buy.<\/p>\n
The family-run Aotearoa Disaster and Community Resources charity distributes packages to vulnerable people in the community.<\/p>\n
Brockbank said police and insurance were now involved.<\/p>\n
He said the theft has meant volunteers have had to turn their attention and time to figuring out next steps.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe cost of upgrading security takes away any good help from the community.\u201d<\/p>\n
ADCR is a family-run volunteer business that began after Cyclone Gabrielle and has since been used in other disasters and for the community on a weekly basis.<\/p>\n
The team said it had supplied more than 150,000kg of food and other goods to people in need, year to date.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cWe are so sorry to our families in our schools and communities that we have told food is…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":441144,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[95,1977,30608,564,71,2070,111,43,139,69,1118,4056,36096,1120,153086,30590,50898,13797,65861,225207],"class_list":["post-441143","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-and","tag-charity","tag-familyrun","tag-food","tag-from","tag-full","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-of","tag-person","tag-steal","tag-takes","tag-thames","tag-thief","tag-tools","tag-used","tag-waikatos","tag-wheelbarrow"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/441143","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=441143"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/441143\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/441144"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=441143"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=441143"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=441143"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}