Billed as the first community hub of its kind, the newly opened Feeding Tampa Bay Causeway Center is a major step up for the nonprofit that provides food rescue and distribution for 10 West Central Florida counties.
A tour of the state-of-the-art, 215,000-square-foot facility gives testament to both the relief organization’s growth and mission needs, which spiked considerably with the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic. Feeding Tampa Bay reportedly serves 2 million meals weekly and is on track this year to serve 85 million meals.
But it’s not just food insecurity addressed at the center, where the aim is to get to the root of the problem that causes hunger. As a “one-stop shop for service access, community connection and collaboration,” empowerment offerings include financial assistance, benefits navigation and family, health and mental health services. Job and training services include FRESHforce training for certification in commercial driving, warehouse logistics, culinary arts and barista.
Jim Carpenter of Brandon is the director of facilities and disaster response, hired in 2016 to work at Feeding Tampa Bay, which is part of the Feeding America network of food banks. “I was part of the group that started the planning process for this building,” Carpenter said. Having visited three food banks in Texas, “from each of them we learned what they did right, what they did wrong and what they would do differently.”
Feeding Tampa Bay left behind its 80,000-square-foot home, one of many spaces in the back of a distribution center off Adamo Road and 50th Street at 4702 Transport Dr. The new $60 million, two-story warehouse sits 5 miles away on an 18-acre plot at 3624 Causeway Blvd., west of U.S. Highway 41. Funding includes $5 million from the American Rescue Plan Act, an allocation approved by Hillsborough County commissioners.
Comparing old to new numbers, Carpenter said Feeding Tampa Bay has grown from 1,400 to 4,200 pallet positions, from 18 to 29 docks (expandable to 36), from 330 to 515 parking spaces and from 18 to 32 feet of racking height. The new space, roughly the size of three regulation-sized American football fields, allows for dry, cold and frozen refrigeration. It’s home to 35 trucks and five tractor-trailers. The enterprise has 160 employees.
Count among them spokesperson Shannon Hannon Oliviero, who on a recent tour of the facility noted volunteer opportunities (two shifts daily, six days a week) and the more than 300 nonprofit partners that use Feeding Tampa Bay to stock food banks and services throughout the 10-county service area.
Noted online are the nonprofit’s 136 donors, 14 food partners, 26 volunteer partners and 26 annual partners. Supporters include those featured on outdoor building signs for various spaces, including the entryway (Florida Blue), market (Publix Charities) and bistro (Trinity Cafe). The Community Space (Hillsborough County) is a fully equipped and versatile event space tailored to facilitate community events, including partner collaborations, team-building activities, galas, fundraisers and business meetings. The maximum capacity is 485 guests. Charges are for setup, cleanup and on-site catering, with proceeds helping to support Feeding Tampa Bay’s mission.
Oliviero’s tour included a stroll through refrigerators and kitchen spaces for production, training and catering, as well as the volunteer lounge, market, soft-skills training room and spaces for roughly 20 on-site partners, including Metropolitan Ministries, Bay Area Legal Services, Hillsborough County, the City of Tampa and BayCare Health, along with an exam room and self-service Higi station for weight and blood-pressure testing.
As for what motivates her to work at Feeding Tampa Bay, that would be “meeting the most incredible people with the most interesting stories,” Oliviero said. “You wake up and you go to bed every day with a purpose.”
For more on Feeding Tampa Bay, its services, hours, support and volunteer opportunities, visit www.feedingtampabay.org/causeway.
