UGM to feed thousands for Easter feast
Posted March 26, 2016 8:17 am.
This article is more than 5 years old.
VANCOUVER (NEWS 1130) – Up to 3,000 meals will be served today for those down on their luck at a busy downtown shelter.
This is the 27th straight year the Union Gospel Mission on East Hastings has opened its doors for an Easter feast.
Jeremy Hunka with the UGM says this year’s meal comes during a disturbing trend on the Downtown Eastside.
“Our shelter has been more full than it has ever been, a record setting January and February providing more shelter spaces than any time in our history and that is concerning to us, that the need is so great,” he explains. “A lot of the people who are coming to us, men and women unfortunately are on deaths doorstep, some of them. They are desperate; some of them are addicted, they have lost all hope and our Easter meal is about saying ‘there is hope, we do care, and you are not alone.'”
As for what’s on the menu today, 2,500 pounds of ham will be drenched in 270 litres of pineapple sauce, along with 900 pounds of scalloped potatoes.
