In Western Illinois those who need assistance from food banks, will soon be able to get more fresh fruits and vegetables.
The Central Illinois Food bank, based in Springfield, distributes food to pantries across central and western Illinois including in Adams and Schuyler counties.It’s moving to a larger warehouse to be able to handle more fresh produce.
Spokeswoman, Kaleigh Friend, said the amount of fresh foods it distributes increased from under 100,00 pounds five years ago, to 1.5 million pounds last year in 2012.
Friend says the food bank has had to send donations to other food banks, because it simply didn't have the room to store them.
"Just in the past year alone we had to divert over 700,000 pounds of food to other food to other regional food banks cause we just didn't' have the space to store it at out facility," Friend said," we won't have to do that anymore."
The new warehouse is over twice the size of the old one and contains much more refrigerated storage.
Friend said the facility will be finished by late summer and will be up and running by the end of the year.
