For 16 years in a row Jasper鈥檚 hungry have had at least one meal a week to count on through the winter.
According to Community Outreach Services (COS), 3,236 people flocked to the Jasper Activity Centre for a free meal over the course of 13 Sundays this winter.
The last dinner was held on April 9 and hosted by the municipality.
Over the course of the season, people got to try a variety of meals from a southern barbecue meal hosted by the Fairmont Jasper Park Lodge to a Syrian dinner prepared by two local refugee families and the Jasper Rotary Club.
The now well-known lore associated with the community dinners reaches back to 2002, when Marmot Basin was unable to open at the outset of a decidedly dry season. COS stepped in providing employees with a free meal every Sunday to provide relief to the young folks with no income and things just snowballed from there.
The dinners are funded in part by the goodwill donations of diners.
Craig Gilbert | [email protected]
