There are many employees and volunteers in not-for-profit organizations who qualify as Hidden Heroes. They quietly do small things that make a big difference and sadly much of what they do goes unnoticed by most of us. One of these not-for-profits is Nanaimo Foodshare.

Two of their programs that stand out for me are the Summer Lunch Munch Program, which feeds lunch to kids participating in eleven summer day camp programs run by Parks and Rec and the Gleaning Program, which arranges for volunteers to pick excess produce grown by homeowners in our community.

The Summer Lunch Munch Program provides 200 or more kids with a healthy lunch each weekday through the summer. Many of these kids count on the lunch program at school during the year and might well go hungry during the summer. The lunch includes a sandwich, fruit or a vegetable, fresh water, and a special baked treat.

The baked treat (healthy muffins, banana bread or cookies) come thanks to Sharon Lindsay who quietly volunteers her time to bake for these kids. She says that children should have a home-baked treat everyday and she is doing her best to make sure these kids get just that. Is she a Hidden Hero or what?

The Foodshare staff has come up with a number of creative ways to teach kids about the importance of eating a well-balanced diet but the most creative of these has to be the bicycle driven food processor. Given this contraption kids add the proper ingredients, peddle the bike and make things like fruit smoothies and humus. Given their personal involvement in the process, many of them try healthy foods they would never try otherwise.

This program, which costs about $25,000 a year, has been sponsored this year by: Coastal Community Credit Union. Lantzville Legion 257 Ladies Auxiliary, Nanaimo Harbour Lites Lioness, Children's Emergency Foundation, the Rotary Club of Nanaimo North, Serauxman, Quality Foods, Canadian Springs, HRSDC and the BC Gaming Commission; Hidden Heroes all.

Individuals can get involved too. A donation of just $40 will buy lunch for a child for the entire summer. You can sign up by calling 753-9393 and it's definitely not too late to sign up for this year.

The Gleaning Program, which Nanaimo Foodshare runs in partnership with Nanaimo Community Gardens, connects dozens of volunteer pickers with homeowners who have extra produce growing on their property; things like apples, cherries, pears, all kinds of berries, tomatoes and more.

This produce is then shared with the homeowners, the volunteers and fourteen agencies in the community such as Loaves and Fishes and the Salvation Army. Some of the produce is also used in the Summer Lunch Munch Program.

Here's how you might be able to help out; you can offer to have volunteers pick extra produce from fruit trees on your property; you can plant a bigger garden than you need for yourself and have volunteers pick the additional food; or you can call Nanaimo Foodshare and offer part of your property to be cultivated and gardened by volunteers - They'll even share some of the produce with you at the end of the growing season!

To learn more, and become a Hidden Hero yourself, call 753-9393.

As a follow up to last week's column on retired principal, Bruce Mitchell, one of his former teachers read about how Bruce spent Sunday evenings calling students, parents and teachers to acknowledge them for various successes. The day before she had read about one of her former students who had just received his Master's degree from the University of Victoria and after reading about Bruce, decided to call the boy's parents to congratulate him. Later she called Bruce to say that she would definitely do this more often because it had been such a wonderful experience. The "ripple affect" works!