|
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
Open Heart Kitchen and its community partners reached a significant milestone last week with the soft opening of the Vineyard Resource Center in Livermore.
All services were launched last Monday at the new supportive housing and services development located at 450 N. Livermore Ave., where OHK is operating the commercial-scale kitchen and dining room to provide fresh and nutritious meals.
Referred to as “Vineyard 2.0” during construction, the facility features about two dozen apartments of permanent housing to help the most vulnerable low-income families, along with other services such as showers, laundry, mailboxes and temporary overnight shelter.
The site was previously occupied by the Vineyard Christian Fellowship. The redevelopment of the space was a collaborative effort between OHK, the cities of Livermore, Dublin and Pleasanton and the Housing Consortium of the East Bay along with other partners.
Though services are already underway and residents have started moving into the apartments, OHK executive director John Bost said an official grand opening and ribbon cutting ceremony won’t take place until May to coincide with affordable housing month.
Food bank fundraising
OHK also recently announced the successful completion of a matching campaign in partnership with the Community Health & Education Foundation for its new food bank, also located in Livermore.
The campaign raised a total of $75,000 for the project. Gifts were matched up to $50,000 from 135 individuals who donated toward the campaign, along with the $25,000 matching funds from CHEF, according to a statement from OHK.
“We are immensely proud to partner with non-profit organizations like Open Heart Kitchen in their noble endeavors,” said CHEF executive director Maria Mancini in a statement.
OHK officials said they now have about $500,000 left to fundraise toward the overall $3 million goal to complete the food bank.
“The build-out of the Open Heart Food Bank will create an infrastructure for large-scale food distribution in the Tri-Valley,” said Denise Boulter, OHK development director. “If a wildfire occurs or a major earthquake hits right now, we are unprepared for a regional disaster-related emergency that would cut off the Tri-Valley from resources in western Alameda County.”
Opening a larger facility capable of handling high quantities of food is also key in expanding OHK’s overall outreach, according to the organization.
“The Open Heart Food Bank will function as a redistribution center for Dublin, Pleasanton, and Livermore, providing support to local food pantries with fresh produce and grocery items,” said OHK operations director, Shawnda Bost.
“During the pandemic Open Heart Kitchen served over 3 million meals through the emergency food distribution at the Alameda County Fairgrounds and surrounding areas. We realized that our operations could be scaled to provide groceries in addition to our existing meal programs,” added Bost. “The Open Heart Food Bank program was simply the logical next step for us to meet the growing demand.”
Currently, OHK operates its administrative offices, food donation processing, Mobile Pop Up Pantry and Street Outreach Program out of the 19,000-square-foot warehouse located on Marathon Drive in Livermore which will soon also be home to the food bank.
OHK officials said the food bank is still on track to open this summer.
“We invite supporters to help build this important and necessary food bank by making a gift, touring the facility with our staff, or applying to volunteer,” said Boulter.
For more information on OHK and its programs, visit openheartkitchen.org.
