A grant will help a Scranton nonprofit organization store and distribute food to people in need.
Friends of the Poor received a $413,013 Resilient Food Systems Infrastructure grant to install a centralized cold-storage food distribution hub, officials announced this week.
It will be floor to ceiling, with two refrigerated units and a freezer unit, and located in a warehouse the organization leases at 240 E. Elm St. in South Scranton. It is currently used for the organization’s furniture bank.
President and CEO Meghan Loftus said the new hub, which she said is the size of a garage, will replace the organization’s current walk-in cooler and freezer, which is able to fit only four pallets of food at any time. The new unit will be at least 20 times the size of the current unit, she said.
“We serve north of 160,000 people a year, so that’s really not enough space for us,” Loftus said. “We run through that amount of food in just a day or two.”
The organization will move the furniture bank from the site to accommodate the larger units. The site has two employees and there is a potential for more people to be hired once the hub is in operation, she said.
The larger cold storage allows Friends of the Poor and its partner agencies to purchase and accept perishable donations of food in bulk, Loftus said. Currently, nonprofits that receive food from CEO Weinberg Northeast Regional Food Bank drive to its facility in Jenkins Twp. or get food delivered weekly. In addition, she said several of the organization’s partner agencies accept only perishable foods that can be distributed in a safe time frame because they lack the cold storage.
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Friends of the Poor’s warehouse pictured Tuesday, July 1, 2025. The organization plans to use the facility to house a cold-storage food distribution hub. (Christine Lee/Staff Photo)
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Friends of the Poor’s warehouse pictured Tuesday, July 1, 2025. (Christine Lee/Staff Photo)
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Friends of the Poor’s warehouse pictured Tuesday, July 1, 2025. The organization plans to use the facility to house a cold-storage food distribution hub. (Christine Lee/Staff Photo)
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Having the larger cooler and freezer units cuts down on the commute for food distribution entities in the county and allows people to get healthy, perishable food from one source. It also allows the organization to purchase food directly from area farmers, store it and distribute it.
Loftus said she is thrilled to receive the grant, which the organization received as it continues to see demand for food assistance. Since 2021, the number of people requesting food from the organization has more than doubled, and increased an additional 15% since last year, she said. Loftus attributes the rise to increased awareness of the services and the cost of living. The need increases during the summer, when schools, which provide breakfast, lunch and snacks, are closed.
“This isn’t necessarily about ‘Friends of the Poor got this grant.’ It’s about a grant that’s coming to our community that’s going to help everybody, no matter what agency you go to, or if you need help and you’re part of the emergency food distribution network, then this is going to benefit that,” she said.
Loftus hopes the new unit will be in operation by the end of next spring.
The organization is one of four entities in Northeast Pennsylvania to be awarded Resilient Food Systems Infrastructure grants, which help local farms, nonprofits and food producers expand capacity, modernize equipment and strengthen the region’s food supply chain. The funds come from the state’s Resilient Food Systems Infrastructure program, a cooperative agreement with the U.S. Department of Agriculture that provides dollar-for-dollar matching grants to support food processing, distribution and aggregation from multiple farms to help meet demand for local, seasonal and fresh food.
Other recipients of the grants include:
The Food Dignity Project, Luzerne County, $723,839 to build cold storage, processing and delivery systems to support 29 farms and launch 15 new value-added products in Luzerne County.
Michael Family Farm, Luzerne County, $77,023 to purchase and install on-farm dairy processing equipment to expand product offerings and markets for farms in Lackawanna, Luzerne and Wyoming counties.
Hopkins Farm, Wyoming County, $749,496 to modernize and expand vegetable processing and cold storage to improve safety, energy efficiency and revenue for Hopkins and farm partners.