Executive Director's update for July

As I write this on July 5th there is the sound of a jack hammer in the background and the parking area is full of trucks as a crew works on the cinder block walls for the building expansion. Real progress is being made and, with a quiet storm season thus far, we couldn’t be happier. July will continue steady progress on improving our capacity. The loan paperwork to complete the construction at the Theodore facility has just been completed so we can pay the contractors for the work being done, I’m sure they think that’s a good thing! In a week we expect the Santa Rosa County Commission to complete action on the sale of our two acre parcel for the west Florida facility and two weeks later approve a bond action that will help us finance construction of that building.

We’ve had several meetings and discussions with the Florida facility design team and they have started development of actual design plans. We are aiming at keeping the initial project at $1 million while creating a facility of approximately 14,000 square feet. That’s all we can afford but should give us a building capable of supporting west Florida for several years as we grow distribution from 1.75 million pounds annually to over 3 million pounds. At that point we’ll add more warehouse space to allow growth towards our long range goal of over five million pounds of distribution annually. With distribution over 5 million pounds we will finally be able to say that the people of west Florida are getting the level of support they need and deserve compared to other locations in America. Combined with our Alabama and Mississippi distribution we will be distributing approximately 15 million pounds of food annually.

Financing two $1 million dollar projects at once is a challenge. The Board and staff of the Food Bank feel that it is necessary in order to help the hunger relief efforts being conducted by the hundreds of organizations we support reach the level already achieved in other parts of the country. The additional warehouse space will allow us to bring in more donated food and make it available for distribution. The Emergency Kitchen will allow us to expand our child nutrition program with hot snacks during the school year and a rotation of hot and cold lunches during the summer. Of course, should a disaster occur, we will have a facility capable producing thousands of meals per day for distribution in cooperation with organizations like the Red Cross and Salvation Army. Both the new building addition and the kitchen area will be highly storm resistant to allow staff to shelter prior to a storm and immediately begin support following a storm. To make all this happen the Board has created a fundraising committee that will be working with the staff to find foundations and businesses will to help us pay off 50% of the money we’re investing to ensure we have enough money after mortgage payments to improve operations. It is not an easy task but one we need to do to what is best for the community. So, if you happen to have $200,000 or $300,000 laying around let us know and well show you a very worthy way to use it!