The Poverello House expanded its capacity to serve more people in need

FRESNO, Calif. (KFSN) -- They raised the roof and now the Poverello House wants to give thanks, this holiday season.

The charity organization kicked their annual Turkey Drive Monday morning at their new state of the art facility in Downtown Fresno.

Cruz Avila said, "This starts the blessing that we are returning back to the community. If you look at the warehouse that we had before about nine thousand square and now we are up to about almost 20,000 square feet."

Chief Executive Officer Cruz Avila says the old facility for the Poverello House was nearly 75 years old and it did not have refrigerators or freezers to store turkeys or other cold goods.

The new facility will allow for those items to be stored on site helping the Poverello House provide 16 hundred meals daily.

"But at the end of the day were addressing that emergency need and that's what this warehouse and capacity now to be able to store all those goods to really implement maybe three to four times amount of services," explained Avila.

Foods that needed to be stored in freezers were located off-site and Cruz says transporting those items cut into the Poverello House's budget.

Donations and fundraisers paid for the new facility thanks to the community support.

And Cruz hopes that same support from the community will help the organization collect over 2,000 turkeys this holiday season.

Avila said, "And just to be able to give it back to the community. And what better way to say thank you and to have a great Thanksgiving and to be able to give to our homeless population."

The turkey drive continues through the end of the month but donations are accepted any time of the year.