Wishes for the future of Samaritan House

Samaritan House has been in my life for a long time — I collected cans in elementary school, distributed produce in middle school and served Thanksgiving dinner at the King Center as a student at San Mateo High School. And it’s a family thing; my mom joined the Board of Directors in 2010, becoming president of the board in 2013.

I’m not sure how much context future readers will need around life in San Mateo in the 2000s, 2010s and 2020s. But in 2025, Samaritan House is a keystone, supporting people here with all sorts of needs. Many are working, many are parents, many are disabled or elderly (or all of the above!). The organization is headquartered above Ruby’s busy kitchen on Pacific Boulevard, and Cora’s Community Market recently opened to provide a free “grocery shopping” experience for clients. In recent years, Samaritan House has weathered the COVID-19 pandemic and ever-increasing need while running multiple shelters, hosting medical and dental clinics and much more.

Every Tuesday morning I arrive at the kitchen with my mom. We call out greetings to staff — Ruby, Carmen, Daniel, Luis, Marvin, José, Renee, Tereso, John, James and more. Then we tie on aprons, roll up our sleeves and get to work. 

The Tuesday morning volunteer crew has settled over years into roles that define our mornings: Joan has a veggie station, my mom heroically tackles the meat counter, Larry and Michi bag mobile meals for delivery and Joanne buzzes around the kitchen emptying trash cans. We bop along to Spanish-language radio or an R&B playlist on the tinny speaker above the back counter, and turn out tray after tray of delicious-smelling meals. I spend the most time with Chris, Grace, Restu, Jack, Dolores and Bernard in the kitchen, which (along with the market, the Kid’s Closet and the parking lot) bustles with too many volunteers to name. They turn up week after week, contributing their time, muscles and brain power to the collective cause of caring for our neighbors.

The primary goal at Samaritan House is helping people who need things: food, shelter, medicine. And that’s vital. But the secret secondary reason I love this organization is that it allows me to be part of this team of good hearts. 

I choose to be a Samaritan House volunteer because when problems like homelessness and poverty feel too heavy to bear, they become a little less crushing every time another pair of hands takes some of the weight. 

My mood is lighter every time I look around and see a volunteer arrange a salad so the heart-shaped strawberry slices rest on top, ready to cheer up a senior citizen. It’s lighter when someone smooths a sticker label for a diabetic meal onto a specially-prepared container. When it hurts to encounter former classmates as clients at a meal distribution, it helps to be with the folks who work to make San Mateo safer and healthier for every person in it. To lift the load just a little. 

I don’t know what life will be like when this time capsule is opened, but here’s my prediction: The world will be better than it is today, but not yet perfect. Wherever Samaritan House is located, on Tuesday mornings (and all the other days too) you’ll find people working away to the sounds of a decades-old radio in a steamy kitchen. They’ll be wearing futuristic sneakers and maybe kilts (in the future we’ll all wear kilts, probably), and they’ll have arrived in self-driving buses fueled by used french fry oil. 

And they’ll come together for the same reason: Because there’s nothing better than taking care of other people. Maybe I’ll still be there, or maybe it’ll be someone else. But there will always be people ready to do what Samaritan House does, which is love. 

Vicky Stein is a science writer, illustrator, Samaritan House volunteer, and president of the San Mateo Public Library Foundation.