Feeding Northeast Florida remodeling warehouse complex to meet growing food insecurity needs

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Feeding Northeast Florida is working to renovate a four-building warehouse complex in North Jacksonville.

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The campus will serve as a home to the region’s largest nonprofit food bank and hunger relief networking organization.

President and CEO of Feeding Northeast Florida Susan King told our news partners at WOKV that food insecurity is a problem THAT continues to grow, and the rising cost of inflation is just one factor playing into it.

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Now, the nonprofit hopes this remodeled campus will help them meet the needs of the community. It sits on 12 and-a-half acres at 5245 Old Kings Rd., and it will include a warehouse, a distribution center and an operations center.

This site will also include a larger cooler and freezer to double their storage space so that they can accept large food donations.

Plus, the organization will be able to onboard more volunteers with this space, which King said is the backbone of the organization.

Some other new features will include a bio-digester system to transform food waste into compost so that it doesn’t get dumped into landfills.

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To put the growing need into perspective, King said 30% of families reaching out for help have never accessed a food pantry before.

Construction is expected to be done by the end of this year.

Feeding Northeast Florida provides services to eight local counties: Baker, Bradford, Clay, Duval, Flagler, Nassau, Putnam and St. Johns Counties.

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