BAKERSFIELD. CALIF, (KERO) — Audrey Chavez, a Kern County advocate and business owner, has dedicated her life to supporting her community while promoting kindness and compassion for all.
- Audrey Chavez, a Kern County resident, founded the Bakersfield AIDS Project and Ricky's Retreat, the county's first AIDS hospice home.
- She runs Martin's Meats and Deli, where she offers free community resources like the "Blue Shelf" with food, hygiene products, and Narcan.
- Audrey advocates for immigrants and believes in the power of compassion, empathy, and community support.
- She encourages kindness as an easy, impactful way for anyone to make a difference.
BROADCAST TRANSCRIPT:
A local woman says we need to spread kindness to everyone and everywhere we go. She says kindness starts with one and can expand to others.
This is Audrey Chavez. She was born and raised in Kern County. I met her a couple of months ago while working on a story about her brother. Her brother, Ricky Montoya, passed away from AIDS in 1992.
In 1993, Chavez founded the Bakersfield AIDS Project, and in the late '90s, Ricky’s Retreat was established, which became Kern County’s first AIDS hospice home. "There were no existing hospice homes at all in Kern County, and so I learned about hospice and being there for my brother and actually became a certified hospice provider." She said.
Not only does she run the Bakersfield AIDS Project and Ricky’s Retreat, but she’s also an advocate for immigrants and has a family-owned business, a local mom-and-pop shop called Martin’s Meats and Deli. Audrey says, "We love it because it's a little space of our own, but it's a space that we love to be able to serve our community." And she does serve the community.
At Martin’s Meats and Deli, there’s a place called the Blue Shelf where they offer items like canned food, can openers, hygiene products, and more. She also provides free Narcan to the community outside the deli.
Audrey says she has "different things that people need and don't have money for or don't have access to, and so it's a spot that people can go in and feel at home and go in and take what they need as they need it."
She says she does this because it’s her community. Caring for others and letting them know love exists motivates her to do all she does, all while running a business.
Audrey says it’s not difficult to share what you have, lend a helping hand, or simply lend an ear because you never know what’s going on in others' lives. "I think that it's important... I know that it's important to take the opportunities to do good every day that we can because we never know..."
Audrey says being kind and showing kindness are easy acts anyone can do.
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