Cornerstones celebrated the opening of its FREE from Hunger Center on Monday night in Sterling.

It’s a major expansion for the nonprofit that has been helping Fairfax County families in need for more than 50 years. The 10,000-square-foot center will be a food distribution hub to help keep the shelves of area food pantries throughout the Dulles Corridor region well-stocked. The center will help make better use of soon-to-expire food from grocery stores and serve as a storage area for community food pantries providing direct-to-consumer services.

“This is truly a hub. The front of the building provides offices training, space and community meeting and event space. In the space you’re in now, we’ll collect will be used to collect, store, repackage and distribute thousands of tons—I said, thousands of tons—of otherwise potentially wasted food,” said Cornerstones’ immediate past chair Larry Schwartz.

The center was made possible through a $300,000 donation by Bob and Lisa Van Hoecke, and support from HomeAid Northern Virginia and Community Partners Fairfax County, Floris United Methodist Church | Restoration Reston, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Creative Strategies, and Gary and Kate Buschelman.

Cornerstone board member Bob Van Hoecke said the center has been a dream of his for 20 years. 

“So, we all hear about how in United States most families could not survive a unexpected medical bill. People are living paycheck to paycheck. A bill as low as $400 could jeopardize a family’s ability to stay in a house,” he said. “We sit here between two of the wealthiest counties in the United States and yet food insecurity is the problem. We have the means of solving this. Nearly every family has the potential to be impacted by food insecurity, either directly or indirectly. And we’re not just talking about people that are homeless or economically challenged; we’re talking about school teachers, police officers, first responders, caregivers to our children.”

The former Army quartermaster sees the hub center concept as critical to improving the supply chain.

“Parents in our community shouldn’t have to make a decision between taking their kids to the doctor buying medicine or feeding their kids. We can solve that problem. It’s not a supply problem. It’s a logistics problem. We have more than enough food to feed everybody. We need to get that food into the mouths that need it,” Van Hoecke said.

“We listened to the needs of nonprofits, faith, schools and neighborhood-based pantries of all sizes serving families and individuals in Fairfax and Loudoun counties,” CEO Kerrie Wilson said. “The common challenge is that local pantries do not have sufficient storage space. They often have to divert precious budget resources to cover the increasing costs of renting storage facilities. Our FREE from Hunger Center will allow us to rescue more food from individual donors, restaurants, and other sources and increase partners’ capacity to quickly get food into the hands of neighbors who need support immediately.”

Cornerstones was formed in 1970 and serves 16,000 people, including 5,000 children, each year living along the Dulles Corridor. The new Sterling center will also serve as its gateway office into Loudoun County where the nonprofit is building 260 new affordable homes.

The distribution is located at 22560 Glenn Dr. 

Learn more at cornerstonesva.org.