Santa Barbara County Foodbank makes progress one month after eucalyptus tree fell on facility

SANTA BARBARA, Calif. - After a giant eucalyptus tree fell on top of the Santa Barbara County Foodbank facility, causing $50,000 in damage, crews say it looks much worse than it really is.

"Just a little hiccup in the road … won’t affect us … providing food for the community you know," said warehouse supervisor Jesse Aguilar of the Santa Barbara County Foodbank.

Since the incident, the foodbank moved its office space to a pop up truck.

"Some people love it we have air-conditioning … which the old fire station that we occupied for 30 years does not have … so that’s nice but you know it’s an inconvenient … we don’t have our usual collegiality," said senior communications manager Judith Smith-Meyer of the Santa Barbara County Foodbank.

The fallen tree created a hole in the sidewalk.

Crews are working to fix the pavement.

"The sidewalk was lifted up entirely because The tree fell over with the roots And the whole tree came off the ground," said Smith-Meyer.

Despite the accident managers at the foodbank say they’ve continued to deliver more than 25,000 pounds of food every day.

"Moving forward we’re thinking ahead to better capacity and more technical advanced and being able to take care of the community in case of disaster," said Smith-Meyer.

"We let our operations just run normally … it’s like very simple and no matter what happens … we have the same goal which is to provide food for the community … so we’ll do it no matter what," said Aguilar.

The foodbank team said they’re just grateful no one got hurt during the incident.

Anyone wishing to donate may visit http://foodbankcbs.org.