The largest food bank in the bi-state area is preparing to serve even more people from its new location. The River Bend Foodbank will celebrate its grand opening today in southwest Davenport. The foodbank moved into its new home in February, but executive director Tom Laughlin says it has taken a few months to get settled. The facility is 60,000 square feet, three times the size of the old foodbank in downtown Moline.
"We've got 20 work stations in this facility. We only had three in the other one. We had very very little freezer and cooler space, so really on aspects, this facility is just a winner compared to where we were."
River Bend has 12 loading docks and enough space to store 7 truckloads of food. Laughlin says the foodbank distributed over 8 million pounds of food to the eastern Iowa and western Illinois last year, and hopes to increase that number.
"We keep adding our backpack program. We hold more mobile food pantries. We've done some senior intiatitives at highrise where we've gone out with fruits and vegetables, so we're adding more initiatives as we go along with the facility."
The River Bend Foodbank will hold a ribbon cutting ceremony at 4:30 pm at 4010 Kimmel Drive in Davenport.