B.C. woman weaves old plastic bags into insulating mats for the homeless

As another cold snap hits B.C’s south coast, some of the most vulnerable members of the community are desperate to keep warm.

Jenifer Kosman is making it her mission to help through a low-tech piece of gear that can be a lifesaver when the temperature dips below freezing.

Her solution: collecting old plastic bags and weaving them into insulating mats so the homeless don’t have to sleep on the cold ground.

“It’s always on my mind, I’m always thinking about it,” Kosman said of her project. “Any chance that I have, I sit at a table and start weaving.”

So far, she’s woven more than 700 bags into mats.

“I’ve seen those sad stories about the people who caught fire while they were trying to stay warm in a garbage bin or a tent. If it keeps them warm and it keeps them alive, I’ll keep going until I can’t do it anymore.”

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The mats may offer potentially life-saving warmth.

“It provides that layer of insulation but I think it also provides that feeling that somebody out there cares,” Fraser Holland of Langley’s Stepping Stone Community Services Society said.

Kosman has a deeply personal reason for wanting to help those in need.

“My dad’s been homeless for 10 years now,” she said.

By offering a helping hand, Kosman hopes someone will pay it forward and help her father, who remains out of her reach.

“I can only hope at some point, somebody does help him in some way, and I can hope that he would be very grateful for it too.”