Nutley Red Cross Pantry Food Drive Breaks Record

Red Cross North Jersey announced that thanks to the help of Nutley’s Boy Scout Troop 142 and Cub Scout Packs 141 and 142, the Red Cross food pantry in Nutley collected nearly 11,000 food items last month.

In an announcement on their website, the Red Cross' community service manager Lisa Zitola-McGuire said that the scouts have been increasing their collections during the annual food drive in recent years, and noted that this year’s number was record breaking.

“The food pantry here in Nutley assists more than 130 families per month and we’ve been able to do that through community food drives and grants,” she said on the site. “We are grateful to the community for their support.”

Walt Smith, coordinator of project and chairman for Cub Scout Pack 141, told the Red Cross the collection was part of a national effort on behalf of the scouts.

The Nutley scouts pinned shopping bags to doors of homes and asked that people fill the bags with food, he said. In some neighborhoods 60 percent of residents donate. 

“Even though Nutley is a solid town, with the unemployment rate being what it’s been for the last few years, you get some people falling in between the cracks,” Smith told the Red Cross, adding that the food drive also teaches the scouts about the need to help others.

Zitola-McGuire said that 60 percent of the pantry’s food is donated by Nutley residents and that 40 percent comes from the Hillside Community Food Bank.

“We count on the donations,” Zitola-McGuire said as she placed food on pantry shelves. The food drive that they do in the spring holds the pantry over through the summer – during which time donations are low.

She also said that the pantry has seen a greater demand for their services since the beginning of the year. In addition, Zitola-McGuire said the drive helps them increase the number of food items they can report in to the Feinstein Foundation, as part of their participation in the Feinstein Food Challenge.

The foundation provides a $1 million grant that is distributed to food pantries  nationwide each year. The grant is distributed based on the number of food items each pantry has collected during the months of March and April.

Boy Scout Rudolph Meglio, 14, was among the scouts there that day that checked expiration dates on the products and sorted food.

“We’ve had a lot of participants and a lot of generous people willing to donate,” he said, adding: “It makes me feel good.”