MEDFORD, Ore. – ACCESS hosted a ribbon cutting ceremony Tuesday to celebrate its new food storage warehouse in northwest Medford.
ACCESS employees, volunteers and several community leaders gathered to help the non-profit celebrate the milestone.
“I cannot tell you how excited I am that y’all are sitting and standing here in front of me,” exclaimed Marcee Champion, ACCESS Food Programs Director. “This is just a dream come true.”
Champion said the new space is double the size of their previous warehouse and the freezer is three times the size of their old one.
“We’ve been in a teenie tiny warehouse,” Champion said. “If you had been in that warehouse, you might even think ‘golly, that looks like the break room for this warehouse.'”
ACCESS said the old space was the most undersized storage warehouse in Oregon for the amount of people it served.
Now, ACCESS has the space and capacity to help and feed more Jackson County residents than ever.
“No one is in shape to take on the other issues in their lives when their stomach is rumbling or the kiddos haven’t been fed,” Oregon State Reprentative Pam Marsh said.
Marsh, Medford School District Superintendent Bret Champion, as well as representatives from Harry & David were a few of the notable attendees at Tuesday’s event.
“In the Medford School District, we have a shared vision, ‘All are learning and learning is for all.’ But the reality is, that vision can’t come true when there is food insecurity in the house,” Bret Champion said. “So, we rely on folks like ACCESS as partners for a number of things. Chiefly, to help feed our community.”
ACCESS staff wrapped up the festivities with a full tour of the new facility, as well as its new extra large freezer.
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