Feeding the Valley Food Bank to serve half a million meals a month

ALBANY, Ga. (WALB) – Great news in the fight against hunger. Feeding the Valley’s new Albany facility plans to serve half a million meals per month. Construction of the Ledo Road facility should be finished next month. WALB’s Nathalie Moreau toured the new 35,000 square foot facility.

Feeding the Valley’s new location off of Ledo Road will allow the organization to house thousands of pounds of food a day while continuing to fight hunger for the people of Albany.

Frank Sheppard – President and CEO of Feeding the Valley Food Bank
Frank Sheppard – President and CEO of Feeding the Valley Food Bank(WALB)

“This year, we are gonna do four and a half. This facility is going to allow us to get to six, seven, or eight million pounds of food, you know, that’s providing about six and a half million meals. Half a million every month to people in need in the community,” said Frank Sheppard, President and CEO of Feeding the Valley Food Bank.

The facility will also house a new 5,000 square foot freezer.

Feeding the Valley's new food bank on Ledo Road
Feeding the Valley’s new food bank on Ledo Road(WALB)

“Yeah, we are standing inside the cooler here at the new Feeding the Valley Albany site. It’s almost all enclosed it’s getting very close,” said, Sheppard. “Will hold 400 plus pallet spots. That’s a lot of good healthy produce and lean meats that we can get in and store.”

Feeding the Valley runs on donations both locally and federally. Feeding the Valley owns their new facility, in part due to funding from the Department Of Community Affairs.

“Through the United States Department of Agriculture, the USDA, we have a lot of farmers in the community that donates food to us. We also have retailers and manufacturers that donate products,” said Sheppard.

Feeding the Valley's new food bank on Ledo Road
Feeding the Valley’s new food bank on Ledo Road(WALB)

Shepard says he couldn’t be happier to see this plan come to fruition.

“For those families that need a little help making ends meet. Those seniors that are having trouble making it on a fixed income, we’re here to help and it’s great to build this facility and to know it will be here for many many many years to come,” said Sheppard.

Shepherd says 35,000 people are food insecure in this area, 7,000 of them are children in Dougherty County.

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