EASTON, Pa. – After months of planning, fundraising and community support, Eagle Scout candidate Derek Altner delivered 140 first aid kits Wednesday to The Project of Easton Food Pantry, where they will be distributed to people in need.<\/p>\n
“I have all the kits in the back of the van here,” Altner said before unloading the donations alongside family and friends.<\/p>\n
The delivery marked the completion of Altner’s Eagle Scout service project, which began in November 2025 as he searched for a meaningful way to serve his community.<\/p>\n
“It kind of lifts the weight off my shoulders. Like I’m finally here and I get to see the fruits of my labor go out to the public. And now the people get to have this necessity that they’ve been longing for,” Altner said.<\/p>\n
His mother, Stephanie Altner, said the idea came from recognizing that many people do not have easy access to basic medical supplies.<\/p>\n
“Being at home, you’re able to just go to your medicine cabinet and get a band aid. That’s something that he realized people who don’t have that accessibility can’t do, so he thought about the first aid kits,” she said.<\/p>\n
That idea led Altner to partner with The Project of Easton, which identified a need for the kits among the people it serves.<\/p>\n
“I talked to Julio and Julio said they are definitely at need in the food pantry. So, we coordinated with Derek to work on this for his Eagle Scout badge,” said Erin Roman, director of programs for The Project of Easton.<\/p>\n
Altner initially set a goal of assembling 100 first aid kits but wanted each one to include more than just basic medical supplies.<\/p>\n
Each kit contains 37 items, including toothpaste, toothbrushes, combs and ACE bandages.<\/p>\n
Paying for hundreds of supplies proved to be one of the project’s biggest challenges, so Altner organized fundraisers, including a car wash and spaghetti dinner, while also receiving support from local businesses and community members.<\/p>\n
With that support, Altner exceeded his original goal by assembling 140 first aid kits.<\/p>\n
He said the project would not have been possible without the volunteers and donors who supported him along the way.<\/p>\n
“All these volunteers, a lot of them have been helping me this entire time throughout this whole project. I want to say thank you to everybody that’s helped out,” Altner said.<\/p>\n
Altner said he is proud to give back to the community through his Eagle Scout service project and is looking forward to officially earning the rank of Eagle Scout.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"EASTON, Pa. – After months of planning, fundraising and community support, Eagle Scout candidate Derek Altner delivered 140…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":238992,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[214,153,155,154,6290],"class_list":["post-238991","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-bethlehem","tag-_homepage_top_stories","tag-bethlehem","tag-bethlehem-headlines","tag-bethlehem-news","tag-easton-area"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/238991","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=238991"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/238991\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/238992"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=238991"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=238991"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=238991"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}