The long, weathered building on the Grey Bears’ compound on Chanticleer Avenue has served the nonprofit organization for more than 50 years. It’s where volunteers pack bags of groceries to deliver to seniors across the county, the site of a free food market, and a daily hot lunch program that serves up to 300 people a day.
But Grey Bears’ has outgrown the aging facilities, originally built as a chicken coop more than a century ago. The market doesn’t have permanent infrastructure; it’s held behind the building under awnings. The commercial kitchen is cramped, with a short five-foot-long hot food service window. Volunteers set up cold items like salads and desserts on separate folding tables, so guests have to wait in two lines to get a complete meal.
Vital equipment on the site also needs to be updated. The walk-in refrigerators are so old that replacement parts are no longer available, said healthy food program director Danielle Wong. For the past few years, they’ve relied on a volunteer in his 80s, a former Merchant Marine who repaired refrigerators on ships, to keep them running…