EAST PROVIDENCE, R.I. (WPRI) — East Providence officials teamed up with Stop and Shop to make sure no child goes hungry by opening a food pantry at the city’s high school on Thursday.
Stop and Shop also donated $25,000 to fill the shelves with food and personal care items.
Organizers said the “Townie Pride Pantry” will be available to students across the district and their families. Mayor Bob DaSilva said the goal is to make sure every student has access to basic needs.
“It’s getting food to those people who need it the most,” DaSilva said. “We can identify them through our school system on which children are food insecure.”
“Additionally, the school department isn’t only going to just open the pantry so people can come here and pick up, but they’ll be putting bags together and delivering it to the schools where students are food insecure,” he added.
Stop and Shop said the pantry was made possible by a partnership with We Share Hope and Campbell Snacks, which also donated two pallets of Goldfish snacks to the pantry and $125,000 to expand Stop and Shop’s School Food Pantry Program.
East Providence was the second district to benefit from the program, after Rogers High School in Newport got a pantry earlier this year.
