New Castle Launches Food Bank of the Rockies Site at First Baptist Church

What happens when the grocery bills in Garfield County start to stretch thinner than the winter light on the ridge?

It’s a question neighbors have been asking each other at the school gates and the gas pumps, wondering if the pantry shelves will hold. Now, there’s a concrete answer arriving in New Castle. SBC Community Table is launching a new Food Bank of the Rockies distribution site at First Baptist Church, a move that brings professional-grade food logistics to a valley that has long relied on a patchwork of smaller, volunteer-driven efforts.

Esther Von, the director of this new initiative, knows the weight of that question. She didn’t just parachute in from the Front Range with a plan; she arrived in 2024 with a history of feeding people. Her journey began in 2016, not in a boardroom, but in the back of a minivan, bringing food to soccer practices while getting to know families through her sons’ teams in Denver. “As I got to know them, and as they kind of trusted me, I found out kind of how desperate their situations were,” Von said. That trust grew into two established food banks in Aurora and Westminster, organizations that now serve roughly 700 families a week.

But when she moved to New Castle, she resisted the urge to immediately declare independence. She watched the existing landscape, noting that Lift-Up was already serving the area and that the Rockies network operated mobile pantries. “I just feel like it’s super rude to move into a new community and be like, ‘You’re not doing it right, I’m going to start my own thing,'” she said.

Instead, she listened. She found that while help existed, there was still a significant gap in consistent, fresh food distribution. The result is a partnership, not a competition. Von insists they are working alongside Lift-Up, not against them. “We’re in this together. We’re all serving our community,” she said.

The new site at First Baptist Church has cleared the hurdles. It passed inspections and met the detailed standards required by the regional distributor, which will oversee the operation from its Grand Junction warehouse. This isn’t just about handing out cans of beans. The church has installed commercial refrigerators and freezers, allowing them to distribute eggs, dairy, yogurt, and frozen items alongside shelf-stable goods.

Maureen Hanson, an organizer with the group, highlighted the practical reality of this upgrade. “We can provide eggs, dairy products, yogurt, frozen items,” Hanson said. “We have some beef, I believe we’re going to be distributing tomorrow, as well as paper goods, paper plates, napkins, paper towels, bread, stuff like that.”

The soft launch this past Friday offered a glimpse of the scale. Volunteers practiced the flow, moving about 2,000 pounds of food through the system. Von plans to pick up supplies twice a month from both the Grand Junction and Aurora facilities, selecting items based on what the local community actually needs. It’s a logistical rhythm that promises to bring more than just calories to the valley; it brings a steady, reliable hand.

You can feel the shift in the air at the church, where the hum of commercial freezers is about to join the familiar sounds of community life. It’s a quiet infrastructure, built for the long haul, waiting for the first families to walk through the doors and take what they need.