By
Olimpcia Desamour and Michael Gibas
Buffalo
Review – West reporters
The sounds of vegetables
sizzling, young girls chattering over cups of bubble tea and old men in great
debates: The West Side Bazaar has long been a melting pot for different
cultures and now thanks to a new program it could see a new influx of people
joining its tightknit community.
The Erie County Department
of Senior Services was recently awarded a two-, $500,000 grant from the federal
government in order to expand its current senior meal program. The current
program allows senior citizens to walk into senior centers and receive a free
lunch. The new program will partner with local restaurants and will allow
seniors to come in any time of day and receive a meal based on the menu of said
restaurant.
This is where the West Side
Bazaar comes in, home to several up and coming restaurants Erie County
approached the organization will be among the first locations to be a part of
the new program and has also recently received their own grant that will allow
them to expand to a larger location on the West Side.
But Bob Doyle, the
operations manager at the West Side Bazaar, knows this program is more than
just about the food, especially for seniors in the refugee community here in
Buffalo and especially the West Side, which is the second most diverse zip code
in the state of New York.
Doyle hopes that the program
will allow seniors who may feel excluded from places like senior centers for
whatever reason will see this new program as a chance to both be able to get
more culturally relevant food and start forming some connections outside of
their families.
This fits right in with what
the West Side Bazaar is all about, a business incubator that understands the
importance of community.
“Our goal as a business incubator, we really
want to develop businesses, but we want to make sure that we are developing
entrepreneurs that come from our neighborhood,” Doyle said. “Our neighborhoods
are only as strong as the communities that make them up.”
The new program will
hopefully be bringing many new faces and customers to the West Side Bazaar, a
possibility that excites some of the vendors.
 |
| Maria and Alain Rodriguez |
Maria and Alain Rodriguez
owners of Kiosko Latino, a Mexican and Puerto Rican place in the West Side
Bazaar are among them. They believe the program will help them expand their
restaurant.
The other surrounding food
vendors also seemed interested, but Kap Thang from Thang’s Family Restaurant has
some reservations. He said that while he thought the program would be good for
the community, he is still unsure if the it will help his business.
Once the bazaar does move
Doyle hopes to keep the same feeling of crowdedness that is so common in other
countries while creating more seating and places for new vendors.
The program is expected to
start in either January or February of next year and will be available to all
seniors over the age of 60.
