Stan Byias said he heard the Word when he was in jail two decades ago. And countless people have been fed as a result.
“I was addicted — a crackhead,” said the CEO of Brothers of International Faith Inc., sitting in a conference room at business incubator and coworking space CoBiz in downtown Richmond. “I was a thief. I stole food and alcohol to buy drugs.
“I went to jail and the Spirit said to me ‘You can do better than what you’re doing,’ ” Byias said. “It told me about the caterpillar that cocoons into a butterfly. The caterpillar is crawling around the ground, then it goes into the cocoon. The spirit said ‘this jailhouse is your cocoon.’ ”
Byias, who grew up in Richmond, was serving time in Marin County in 2006. At first he was “trying to get my hustle plans on so when I get out of here, I can go back to doing the same stuff that brought me here.”
But then, he saw that the caterpillar would transform into a butterfly.
“My question to God then was, ‘Do I have to change my thought process, in order to change my life? ‘Yeah.’ “I’m never going back to doing the things I did as a caterpillar.”
Meet Your Neighbor: Stan Byias
Who: Stan Byias, 78, CEO of Brothers of International Faith Inc.
Neighborhood: South Richmond
Richmond resident for: Born in Berkeley, Byias has lived in Richmond most of his life
He said: “People are hungry. People are starving. I’ve gone into senior citizens’ homes and heard the man tell his wife, ‘We’re gonna have dinner tonight!’ It’s like they’re celebrating, like it’s out of the ordinary.”
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Byias, 76, is a tall man with penetrating eyes who laughs easily but speaks with conviction. Before his life path landed him in jail, he had been a confident young man, a football star at John F. Kennedy High School and then at San Jose State University until an injury derailed his career and schooling, landing him back in Richmond.
After leaving school, Byias married, had a daughter and worked as a grocery cashier. He also worked at the post office and as a bus driver, all while his addiction grew and started affecting his ability to work.
“I started using crack cocaine and lost my job,” he said.
Byias founded Brothers of International Faith in 2008 after getting out of jail. And the confidence he had as a young athlete still helps him today in his work serving others. He’s been feeding the hungry and helping to house the homeless since he got sober 20 years ago.
“God took my illegal hustle and turned it into the food program,” Byias told Richmondside. “That’s how I got started doing this.”
Now a licensed addiction counselor and a minister, Byias’ organization struck agreements to collect surplus food from grocery stores and food recovery outlets such as White Pony Express (WPE). The group currently stages 11 monthly and bimonthly grocery giveaways at churches, housing developments, the Multicultural Bookstore in Richmond, the Lai Community Center in San Pablo, Richmond’s Crescent Park, and in other Contra Costa and Alameda County cities.
The group also works to get homeless people housed and regularly collects clothes for those in need, including items that UC Berkeley students leave behind when they move out of university housing.
Eve Birge, the CEO of Concord-based WPE, said they deliver 1,661 pounds of food to Brothers of International Faith each week, the equivalent of 1,108 meals.
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“I’ve gone into senior citizens’ homes and heard the man tell his wife ‘We’re gonna have dinner tonight!‘ …like it’s out of the ordinary.”
— Stan “Mr. Stan” Byias
Birge said since May 2023, WPE has delivered 312,070 pounds to Byias’ group, or the equivalent of 209,000 meals. Byias has worked with WPE since 2016.
“Stan has been like family to many on our team,” Birge said. “He knows firsthand how it feels to be unhoused and to struggle and this experience guides his actions. He gives naturally, without any thought of reward, and has committed his life to service for countless years. It is rare to have the privilege of being connected to someone like him and we’re very grateful.”
Byias makes nearly daily rounds to homeless camps and shelters. He carries clothes, shoes and socks in his car, just in case.
“I never know where I will be called to do this,” Byias said. “If I see a person walking down the street with no shoes, I stop.”
About 20 people lined up in front of Cobiz on a recent afternoon for free groceries. Volunteers brought tables out to the sidewalk and loaded them with cartons of milk, sandwiches, bags of pasta, oranges, strawberries, peppers, grapes, avocados, salads, potatoes, pita bread and more.
Richmond resident Julia Leonard said it was her second time coming to this particular grocery giveaway, which started during the pandemic.
“It’s really helpful,” said Leonard, who said she’s disabled and can’t work. “You have a variety to pick what you like. I usually don’t get everything because I don’t eat everything and I don’t like to waste stuff. So I get what I’m going to eat or drink. Milk, maybe some bell peppers, potatoes, a few vegetables, cheese.”
She said she’s able to get enough for about a week and a half. It saves her money and improves her diet.
Jacky Vera got laid off from her job with an environmental nonprofit in December.
“It’s extremely helpful, especially with rising costs of groceries, with the tariffs, with shortages, with food being recalled, and also with the Trump administration cutting funds to food stamps,” Vera said. “Some extra groceries would help out, especially with unemployment benefits being so ridiculously low.”
Andy Espejo also works for a nonprofit that lost government funding.
“I still have a job, but they actually cut our hours,” Espejo said. “Everything helps.”
CoBiz CEO Wesley Alexander said Byias frequently brings food to homeless people “pretty much by himself without support.”
“He’s phenomenal,” Alexander said. “He goes into the unhoused communities. He collaborates with different churches and different organizations. He partners with Whole Foods, with Sprouts, with Trader Joe’s, all the different organizations. He’s an army of one, getting support from many different stakeholders to have an impact in his community.”
Alexander said Byias did this work even while having two hip replacements and, more recently, while grieving the death of his brother.
“He still was making sure that operations were on point. He was still getting to it,” Alexander said.
Byias, who now has two grandchildren and a great granddaughter, gets by on just his Social Security income and laughs when asked if he uses his own money to feed people.
“I see people hungry and I would feed them something that was in my heart,” said Byias, who keeps extra food at home in case someone comes to him late at night or early in the morning.
“People on the street, in the park, on the sidewalk — that’s a person’s home,” he said. “I see people digging in the garbage can for food. I’ve seen people, families sleeping in tents and camp and encampments with their grandparents, the parents, and the kids.
“People are hungry. People are starving,” Byias said. “I’ve gone into senior citizens’ homes and heard the man tell his wife ‘We’re gonna have dinner tonight!’ It’s like they’re celebrating, like it’s out of the ordinary.”
Byias admitted he gets tired but is “fulfilling my purpose. It makes me feel good that I can do this for somebody because it didn’t have to be this way, right? I could have been on that end, right? But it didn’t turn out that way.
“Sometimes I don’t feel like doing it. Yeah, I’ll be hurting, you know, tired. I buried my brother yesterday. But I know somebody is hungry.”
Wonderful story! Richmond has many upbeat stories like this. As Mr. Rogers said, “Look for the helpers.” Thanks to Tony Hicks for a thoughtful take on Mr. Byias’ work. May God give him strength to continue.