The Mustard Seed serves its first meal to its first customer at its new community centre on Monday morning.--SUBMITTED PHOTO
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The Mustard Seed opened its doors to its new community centre Monday morning and served breakfast to about 50 people, says Murray Kumm, the Mustard Seed’s Spiritual Care Chaplain.
A classic breakfast of scrambled eggs, sausage, hashbrowns, toast and coffee was served and Kumm says they had a steady stream of people sit down to eat while they were open from 8-10 a.m. this morning.
“We are able to seat 20 people inside with all the social distancing and all the COVID protocols,” he said. “There are 10 tables with a person at each end, they’re 8-foot tables and they are six feet apart from other people.”
It is the first time in 13 months the Mustard Seed has been able to have people sit inside for a meal. Previously, takeout meals were served from a trailer behind their old building.
Visitors to the community centre are directed to a hand washing station, have their temperature checked and are asked the usual COVID screening questions before sitting down for their meal. Kumm adds they give out masks to those who don’t have one.
The new centre at 503A Allowance Ave., can sit up to 150 people once COVID is gone, says Kumm. He adds the old location could fit about 30 people and that left little room to move around. The new centre has a large kitchen with a walk-in cooler and freezer, stainless steel counters for prep work, an oven and a steam table to keep food fresh and warm.
“It’s probably about five or six times as big. It’s incredible. Over at the Champions Centre we were doing all our prep work on the freezers,” said Kumm.
The upgrades and new building cost about $450,000 – 85 per cent was paid for by local donors and 15 per cent from grants, says Colette Eirich, managing director.
“It’s definitely a much larger, bigger space giving us the opportunity to serve more of our homeless and vulnerable and it gives them a sense of hope and second chances,” she said. “We’re looking forward to being able to help those in need when they come … we’re just excited about it. It’s finally open, and over the next coming weeks we’ll start offering more programs as COVID rules dictate.”
As COVID restrictions eventually loosen, Kumm says more volunteers will be needed to serve the community, but he adds there is currently a strong volunteer base, with 167 active.
For now, both Eirich and Kumm are excited to be open and say the opening day was a big success.
“We didn’t know what to expect on day one and it was just so calm and peaceful,” said Kumm. “You could see people were just happy to be sitting to eat a meal at a real table with a real chair. No more sitting on concrete, no more sitting against a fence somewhere. There were lots of positive comments from our guests today.”
The Mustard Seed’s community centre is open from 8-10 a.m. seven days a week to serve food to those in need.
