A nonprofit organization providing programs for people with special needs has a new home on Scranton’s East Mountain.
The Deutsch Institute, which provides activities and enrichment for people with intellectual and physical disabilities, moved its main administrative offices from Jefferson Avenue to a building at 98 Mountain Lake Road in Robinson Park this week.
The building, which has a distinctive A-frame roof, includes offices, several open spaces for programs, a large kitchen compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act and an outside pavilion the public can reserve. Executive Director Christopher von Ahnen said the spaces are designed to be flexible to host different classes and events.
The move is a long time coming for the nonprofit. It first signed a lease for the building in 2022 and has been completing upgrades to the building using grant funding from the state. Previously, the Arc of Northeastern Pennsylvania leased the park from the 1970s until 2019.
Von Ahnen said finally being in the space feels unreal.
“We’ve invested almost five years into it, and to see it finally culminate in being our new home, it’s surreal,” he said. “We’ve always rented space. We’ve never really had a place we could call our own, our home. So this is kind of a new beginning for the organization and a new home for the organization, so it’s very exciting.”
The nonprofit previously leased space in a building at 825 Jefferson Ave., which also housed Advocacy Alliance and Court Appointed Special Advocates of Lackawanna County. Von Ahnen said the new space has enough room for them to conduct their existing programs and start new ones that are open to the public, such as yoga, cooking and painting classes. It serves around 350 people a year.
“One of the big advantages here is we’re going to be able to offer more programming and more inclusive programming,” he said.
Current programs include dances, bowling leagues, a social club with games, and day trips, which are split between Scranton and its Verve Vertu Art Studio in Dallas. Four people, including von Ahnen, work at the Robinson Park location, and there are 11 employees in Dallas.
Von Ahnen wants to continue the existing programming in the new space, but because it is so flexible, he looks forward to hosting other providers like Arc and Keystone Residential Services for information nights, as well as adding the yoga and painting classes. He also hopes to expand the nonprofit’s programs and services to high school-age students with special needs, having recently hired a transition coordinator. These include providing transitional and pre-employment services and possibly offering a day camp.
The meeting room in the newly renovated Deutsch Institute building headquartered at Robinson Park in Scranton’s East Mountain Thursday, September 24, 2026. (SEAN MCKEAG / STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER)
The Deutsch Institute building sits next to a playground and walking trail at Robinson Park in Scranton’s East Mountain Thursday, September 24, 2026. (SEAN MCKEAG / STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER)
The kitchen is shown in the newly renovated Deutsch Institute building at Robinson Park in Scranton’s East Mountain Thursday, September 24, 2026. (SEAN MCKEAG / STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER)
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The meeting room in the newly renovated Deutsch Institute building headquartered at Robinson Park in Scranton’s East Mountain Thursday, September 24, 2026. (SEAN MCKEAG / STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER)
The Deutsch Institute’s move is the latest improvement to Robinson Park. City officials upgraded the park last year with new disabled-accessible playground equipment, parking, walkways, a multiuse court for basketball and pickleball, and a trail through woods, as well as a fishing dock and kayak launch at Mountain Lake across the street from the playground. The project cost $1.1 million, with money coming from a combination of American Rescue Plan Act funding, a Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources grant and city funds, said Christopher Hughes, communications director for the city.
Von Ahnen said his organization, which offers services to people in Lackawanna, Luzerne, Susquehanna, Wayne and Wyoming counties, provided input on the upgrades and the city has been receptive about implementing them.
“The city’s been great with working with us and bouncing ideas back and forth on how we can make things more accessible,” he said.
Hughes said the city entered a no-cost lease agreement with the Deutsch Institute in an effort to provide available public space in a city park to a valued community organization.
Scranton acquired the park property from Mina Robinson in 1911, according to a public notice in the Oct. 6, 1911, edition of The Tribune Republican.
Robinson and her husband, Philip, who were Bavarian immigrants from Germany, were among the city’s early brewers. After her husband died, Robinson, a widow with 11 children, became a successful entrepreneur in her own right, in brewing and banking.
A large-scale refurbishment of Robinson Park took place in the late 1970s.
Von Ahnen said the space allows them to not only serve more people, but to have a larger public footprint in the area.
“This is going to put more of a spotlight on the organization and give it a chance to grow and serve even more people,” he said.
The nonprofit plans to hold a ribbon-cutting ceremony for the building on Oct. 27 and host an open house sometime in November.