Drivers and Volunteers For Kitchen

Stone Soup (Wisteria Community Association) is a 100% volunteer-powered registered charity located in Nanaimo B.C., that provides food, coffee, water, friendship, donated clothing, and other supplies for at-risk populations. E.g. blankets, socks, tents, hats, toiletries, Naloxone kits and more! This includes people who are homeless or street-entrenched due to poverty and inequity, racism, mental illness and/or substance use disorders. Every night since March 27, 2020, in response to COVID -19 and the shut down of far too many service providers, Stone Soup volunteers have been delivering up to 200 food-safe ‘meal bags’ at several key locations in Nanaimo. (See poster). At first, we were just a handful of people and a pick-up truck, loaded with donated supplies (e.g., sandwiches made from food from the Food Bank, coffee from McDonald’s, blankets from Khalsa Canada etc.). Within a year we purchased a van with funds from donated pop cans, and got busy building a commercial kitchen in order to be able to add hot meals and soup to our nightly service. With donations and supplies from generous and caring businesses and individuals, building contractors who donated time and talents, and community volunteers, Stone Soup transformed an empty storefront into a modern COVID health authority certified commercial kitchen that opened in February 2023. We are now operating our commercial kitchen 7 days a week and are delivering hot food by van to several locations in Nanaimo. (See poster). We also share our kitchen with other organizations who also serve people in need. All funds come from the help of community via small grants and we still do bottle drives. We have no religious / church affiliation and accept everyone ‘where they are at’, with compassion at the core. See for yourself the transformation of the kitchen located here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dxEGxldqMoI