Community Harvest ribbon cutting and open house

FORT WAYNE, Ind. (WANE) Community Harvest Food Bank of Northeast Indiana held an official ribbon cutting ceremony at their Tillman Road facility on Wednesday.

Leaders were showing off the completed renovations at the food bank's facilities. Among the improvements were an expanded Community Cupboard, a new cooler/freezer, an improved reclamation area, and an enlarged SeniorPak and Kids BackPack staging area.

In the newly expanded parking lot, there was also a new truck donated by Isa Canavati, M.D. 

Jane Avery, the Community Harvest Executive Director said she's glad there's a place like this where people in need can go.

"If they can come into an organization like this and into a place like this where it looks and feels like a regular store, where nobody's going to look at what's in their cart or anything else, be that right or be it wrong. It's one of those deals where they can come in here and they can get the products that their family wants, needs and desires," said Avery.

This facility also offers products that aren't available through the food stamp program.

The renovation is the culmination of the Hunger: Help us Fill the Need $5 million capital campaign that kicked off in September 2012.

The goal was to update, enhance and renovate both of Community Harvest's facilities in order to improve operations and replace some of the aging trucks in order to meet need to provide nutritious food to those in northeast Indiana who are struggling.

Renovations on the Tillman Road warehouse facility began in January 2012. Now that the renovations are complete on the warehouse, the Community Harvest Facility on Coliseum Blvd. will become the focus of the project. The Coliseum Blvd. project will include expanding the refrigeration and dry storage areas and a blanch-chill-freeze space to greatly extend the life of fresh produce.

Community Harvest Food Bank is the largest hunger relief organization in northeast Indiana, annually distributing 11 million pounds of food. Community Harvest collects wholesome surplus food and grocery products donated by the food industry – products that might otherwise go to a landfill – and other donors and utilizes it for hunger relief. The food is distributed by 430 human service agencies and churches in its member agency network, serving 21,100 unduplicated clients per week throughout its nine northeast Indiana county service area. These agencies include food pantries, soup kitchens, homeless shelters, rehabilitation centers, and youth and senior citizen programs. Community Harvest Food Bank is a member of Feeding America and Feeding Indiana’s Hungry (FIsH). For more information, visit www.communityharvest.org .