University of Pittsburgh to debut new food lockers to address food insecurity

PITTSBURGH — Recent data shows that 18% of students at the University of Pittsburgh have reported some level of food insecurity. But starting later this week, they’ll have access to some free meals and groceries they can pick up inconspicuously from new food lockers on the first floor of Litchfield Towers.

The 61 temperature-controlled lockers are capable of storing both hot and cold meals. The process is fairly simple: students can download the Pitt Eats app, place an order at one of these locations, and retrieve their food from an assigned locker, all free of charge.

“The simpler, the better, especially if it can happen quickly. Not everyone has a ton of time, so it’ll be good,” said Pitt freshman Natalie Rose. “College is not cheap, and food isn’t cheap, so anything that can lessen both of those is great.”

Quintin Eason, the vice president of operations for the campus, said some of the lockers are designated for standard campus mobile orders, meaning not all of them are for those free eatery meals, so students can pick up the food inconspicuously.

“You would never know if you ordered food from a taco shop down the street or if you got a food insecure meal. No one is going to know,” Eason said.

Eason said every Pitt student qualifies for the initiative, but they must register through the Pitt Pantry. The initiative is paid for through sustainability and food insecurity funds. They plan to add more food lockers around campus to help as many students as they can while helping to reduce food waste.

“We’re feeding 26,000 meals a day here on campus at the University of Pittsburgh, and there’s overproduction,” Eason said. ”We take that food — ready to be served — we repurpose that in these meals. So they’re getting a quality meal that would have been purchased, and we’re putting that in a non-retail environment.”

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