For nearly 21 years, volunteers for a local Nanaimo charity called SPUD (Serving Potatoes to Unrecognized Devas) have been gathering in front of Nanaimo’s downtown casino for 90 minutes one Friday a month to distribute warm baked potatoes (spuds), and warm clothing (duds) to those in need.
On Feb. 7, according to their monthly schedule, volunteers set up tables and tents to serve warm baked potatoes and distribute bananas, cookies, water bottles, and utensils. They also collected donated clothes, needed even more in winter’s cold conditions.
Paul Bentley, a driver for BC Transit, volunteers for SPUD and said, “We usually hand out bus passes” because a majority of the people SPUD serves also ride the bus.
Bradley J., a volunteer of nearly 15 years, said SPUD’s goal is “to end the stigma about homeless people and addicts. We come here with no discrimination and no judgements. We just come here to do what we should be doing, and that is helping people out.”
Kate Peterson, the lead coordinator for SPUD Nanaimo, and a volunteer for 15 years, said, “There’s a lot of seniors who have been coming for years. We know a lot of people by first name… We serve about 200-250 potatoes every month.”
“Sometimes we’ll get 10-15 people, sometimes we’ll get 200 people. It all depends,” Bradley confirmed.
“It really is about community. Everyone’s so grateful,” Peterson said. “I loved the concept, you know, baked potatoes, it was so wholesome…. It’s just heart-to-heart, humans helping humans.”
In Chicago, baked potatoes were distributed to help keep the underhoused warm, as they retained heat for about five hours. While SPUD generally operates for an hour and a half, the potato is served wrapped in aluminium foil if recipients want to save it for later.
“Everything comes out of our own pockets. People come here with what they have,” so while any donations are gladly accepted, food should be wrapped.
SPUD was originally founded 28 years ago in Santa Cruz, California by Jeffrey Armstrong. Armstrong’s wife and co-founder Sandi Graham said, “He (Jeffrey) didn’t have a lot of money at the time, so he went home and he baked potatoes. He got known as the ‘spud’ guy.”
According to Peterson, part of what has kept SPUD going for nearly three decades has been the “consistency of our SPUD’ volunteers” and their connections to the communities they serve.
SPUD now operates in Vancouver, Surrey, Nanaimo, and Victoria and in Asheville, North Carolina. While SPUD has been looking for sponsors and working to expand into more communities, it needs more people to get involved.
Donations to SPUD can be dropped off outside of the casino in downtown Nanaimo, typically on the Friday closest to each month’s full moon. For more information, visit SPUD Nanaimo’s Facebook page where announcements and yearly schedules are posted or visit SPUD’s international site.
