TAMPA, Fla. — When you think of Feeding Tampa Bay, you likely think of a massive warehouse with food in it. But what the non-profit is about to build goes far beyond food.
Feeding Tampa Bay’s new facility plans to help the whole person through multiple resources and services.
President and CEO of Feeding Tampa Bay Thomas Mantz said this will be a big boost to the community since many people are struggling every day and that the building will be more of a community center rather than a food bank.
“Imagine not only will we be offering food, we will be offering with partners financial services training, a grocery store, a restaurant, medical counseling, and medical care,” he said. "We are offering a wide variety of other ways to sign up for benefits and training."
A bigger building means more volunteer opportunities. ABC Action News spoke with a few regular volunteers who explain to us how this new facility will help the organization.
“Just being able to have more volunteers because there are many days you just can't get through the volume of food that we have come out on the floor," Karen Leonard said. "Having that space available, too, we can accept more people."
With all the extra space, we asked Feeding Tampa Bay if they would be able to get enough food to fill it.
“Accessing food still isn't the issue—we have farm food, we have prepared food, we have grocery stores, we are fortunate we are in a food-rich area—our challenge is, we have never had the space or resources to gather as much as we could," Mantz said.
Right now, Feeding Tampa Bay supplies about 95 million meals a year, and in this new facility, they plan to meet the demand for food and supply nearly 150 million meals every year.
Mantz said the money being used for the new space is from donors in the community, corporate support and funds through grant programs.
If you are looking to volunteer with Feeding Tampa Bay, click here.
Feeding Tampa Bay will break ground on the new facility on Tuesday.
