Our story begins nearly a decade ago, when we, a group of inexperienced yet determined youth, became aware of some of the social challenges that plagued our community. Challenges such as poverty, hunger and mental wellness. We set out to tackle these issues head on, and our mission became clear. We needed to nurture healthy families in the Inland Empire by collaborating for social change, promoting healing, and providing direct services.

Driven by love of God and love of justice for the vulnerable members of our community we started our journey at our local parks by taking fresh food out to the homeless community at our local park. We than assisted people by providing them with resources on how to receive help, resources that they otherwise may never have known existed. Soon we realized that to make a real change in some of the social issues it would require something sustainable, and there the challenge began to find funding, a location, and to raise awareness about what we are trying to do.

We then pulled our resources together, started social media campaigns, filmed promotional videos, printed brochures and used our creative energy to share who we are and what we do. We quickly moved to speaking at events about our project and shared our ideas, which caught on quickly with like minded and generous members of our community leading us to be able to secure a location.

In 2013, we opened the doors to a humble location in downtown San Bernardino where we ran our new food pantry and direct assistance programs serving hundreds of families every week. After 5 years of service at this location we needed to expand to meet our growing needs and began the search for a new location. After a long search in 2018, we ran a campaign to purchase a space which would serve as our headquarters. Today, we are located in the heart of San Bernardino. On a day to day basis, we get a variety of guests from local families who pick up food from our pantry or need rental assistance all the way to professional counseling.

Our efforts in fulfilling our mission have not gone unnoticed. Sahaba Initiative was awarded 2018 State of California Non-Profit of the Year by our Assemblywoman Eloise Reyes., yet there is still more work to be done. Our vision is that Sahaba Initiative will be, God willing, a Southern California Muslim nonprofit leader in challenging poverty and providing services to low-income families. We want to sustain families in the Inland Empire with programs that address mental health issues, poverty, hunger while also focusing on creating a narrative and culture of service. We're thankful for all of our generous donors, community leaders and friends who have invested in this project and provided their support since day one.