While Stockton and San Joaquin County residents lined up in their vehicles to receive free food at the Emergency Food Bank Stockton/San Joaquin, U.S. Rep. Josh Harder presented a check of $1,150,000 to the food bank on May 7 for a new warehouse as part of a Community Project Grant.
The funding is in support of the food bank’s new San Joaquin County Food Recovery Hub, which will be an expansion of the already existing location. Harder, along with Leonard Hansen, president and CEO of the Emergency Food Bank of Stockton and San Joaquin, held a news conference on Thursday, May 7, at the Emergency Food Bank, at 7 W. Scotts Ave., in Stockton.
“This investment is going to do so much to upgrade the potential that the Emergency Food Bank has, and ultimately to help it serve even more people across our community. We’re going to be able to build a new warehouse right across the street, and that warehouse is going to double the scale of this emergency food bank,” Harder said. “It’s going to help more cars get through here every single minute … There’s just so much need across our city, especially right now with so many folks that are living paycheck to paycheck.”
According to a San Joaquin County Food Security Hub document, the new warehouse will be located at 18 West Scotts Avenue in Stockton in the south side of the existing warehouse.
The food bank currently serves about 500 vehicles at every distribution, according to an Emergency Food Bank’s news release. Its current warehouse was built in the 1980s and is 7,000-square-feet with no loading dock and is not adequate to support the food banks current scale of need.
Hansen said the food bank currently uses “four 40-foot containers and a rented building at the fairgrounds” to store food.
Hansen said right now when a semi-truck arrives with a donation or delivery from a big supplier, it has to park in front of the street and it has to forklift, pallet jacks, chains with four or five people to unload the truck.
“The new building will allow us to not only increase our capacity to serve and continue to grow. This food bank has grown from 124,000 families served in 2019 to 255,000 served last year. We’ve doubled the amount of food to 7 million pounds a year, and we’ve increased the programs,” Hansen said. “We can continue to do that, but we can also consolidate our operations from many rented facilities and containers that we use in order to be able to make the service.”
San Joaquin County Food Recovery Hub
Hansen, who celebrated his sixth year anniversary with the Emergency Food Bank on Thursday, said the new project will add “dignity to each client” who goes to the food bank for a food box.
“The new 17,400-square-foot warehouse will more than double capacity and include a dedicated loading dock, significantly improving efficiency and expanding the Food Bank’s ability to recover, store, and distribute fresh and shelf-stable food from local and regional partners,” the Emergency Food Bank news release states. “This increased capacity will reduce food waste while ensuring more food reaches families who need it most.”
According to Hansen, “10.8% of San Joaquin County is estimated to be food insecure.”
Harder told The Record this project was important to him as he has seen the need when he has volunteered with his team at the food bank.
“I’ve seen those needs and I know that we need more support for this nonprofit, especially given the cuts to SNAP and food benefits at a federal level, which make this investment more important than ever,” Harder said.
Harder said they are hoping that construction for the San Joaquin County Food Recovery Hub will start by the end of the year or early next year and will be completed by mid or late next year.
“Food banks play a critical role in our communities providing families with essential resources − that’s why I fought for the Emergency Food Bank of Stockton to receive federal funding to expand their services,” Harder said in the news release. “Many of the families that use food banks work full-time jobs but still can’t make ends meet with rising costs. This expansion project will make sure that more families have access to this lifeline with dignity. We can’t let our community go hungry.”
Hansen said they are currently in the design phase. Next, they will select a contractor, which they have two Stockton finalists, and they already choose a Stockton architect who they have worked before. After is getting all the permits and then breaking ground.
Hansen said they have worked with Harder and his staff for the last two years to get the Community Project Grant.
“We are so grateful,” Hansen said.
Hansen said this is a $9 million project, which they have already raised halfway of their budget.
“We can always use more help,” Hansen said.
To learn more about the San Joaquin County Food Recovery Hub, visit stocktonfoodbank.org.
Record reporter Angelaydet Rocha covers business and community news in Stockton and San Joaquin County. She can be reached at arocha@recordnet.com or on Twitter @AngelaydetRocha. To support local news, subscribe to The Stockton Record at https://www.recordnet.com/subscribenow.
This article originally appeared on The Record: Emergency Food Bank receives $1.15 million federal grant for expansion
Reporting by Angelaydet Rocha, The Stockton Record / The Record
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