A sprawling new warehouse just opened its doors in Canarsie, and Met Council says it could change how hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers get food. The $25 million, 22,000-square-foot facility at 5361 Preston Court combines expanded cold storage, a digital ordering system and artificial intelligence tools meant to forecast demand and cut waste across the organization's network of food pantries.
According to VINnews, Met Council opened the warehouse and conference center on Monday, with more than 200 community leaders and more than 20 elected officials turning out for the occasion. The facility will serve as the central hub for Met Council's food distribution network, supporting 344 food pantry partners across the city. Met Council describes itself as the nation's largest Jewish charity dedicated to fighting poverty, and its food assistance and social service programs serve about 350,000 New Yorkers annually, including families, seniors and Holocaust survivors, per the same report.
Notably, a separate account from the construction firm Archstone Builders states that Met Council officially opened its new Preston Court pantry and warehouse back in November 2025, when phase one of the renovation project was completed. Archstone also notes that the warehouse was able to maintain operations throughout the duration of construction, meaning the facility was already functioning even as the larger build-out continued.
Cold Storage and AI Tools Drive the New Setup
Inside, the warehouse includes expanded cold storage and modern inventory systems designed to handle fresh food like chicken, fish, eggs, produce and dairy, the VINnews report states. Artificial intelligence tools will help forecast demand, optimize delivery routes and reduce food waste, a shift that Met Council has been building toward for a while. Separate reporting from the Queens Jewish Link describes Met Council already using AI-powered tools to optimize warehouse operations and route food to partner agencies and pantries based on real-time data.
An on-site digital food pantry will serve residents of Canarsie, letting customers select groceries online and pick up their orders, per the VINnews account. That pantry is set to offer fresh produce, proteins, dairy products and pantry staples, including kosher options. The initiative received help from UJA-Federation of New York, which helped fund the digital food pantry effort. Met Council's broader Kosher Food Network, described by Met Council as the largest kosher food network in the country with 101 pantries, serves all New Yorkers regardless of background and uses a Digital Choice Food Pantry System that lets users order food from home or a pantry site and schedule their own pickup based on preferences, nutritional requirements and household size.
Leaders Pitch the Facility's Reach
David G. Greenfield, Met Council's chief executive, said the warehouse has the capacity to provide food assistance to as many as 1 million New Yorkers, according to the VINnews report. “No New Yorker should have to choose between paying the rent and putting food on the table,” Greenfield said. In a post on X cited by the same outlet, Greenfield also described the facility as the largest kosher food bank in America, said it was built from the ground up, cost $25 million, runs on AI, and was already serving more than 300,000 New Yorkers of every background.
The opening on Monday featured a long list of speakers, including Greenfield, board co-president Joseph S. Allerhand, State Comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli, New York City Comptroller Mark Levine, District Attorney Eric Gonzalez, City Council Speaker Adrienne E. Adams, Met Council's managing director of food programs Hannah Lupien, and Daniel B. Blaser, president of the Jewish Communal Fund. Elected officials in attendance included Vanessa L. Gibson, Leroy Comrie, Kevin S. Parker, Alicia L. Hyndman, Larinda Hooks, Jaime R. Williams, Kalman Yeger, Chris Banks, Farah N. Louis, Mercedes Narcisse and Kim Council, per the VINnews account.
Funding Pulled From City, State and Private Donors
The project was funded through a mix of city, state, federal and private support, the report states. State Sen. Sam Sutton secured a $1 million state matching grant, which Met Council donors and board members then matched. Adrienne E. Adams helped secure city funding for the project as well.
Beyond the new building itself, Met Council's reach extends into other corners of New Yorkers' daily lives. The organization distributed more than 20 million pounds of food in fiscal year 2026 and more than 2 million pounds of kosher food during the recent Tishrei holiday season, per VINnews reporting. The warehouse also supports holiday food distributions before Rosh Hashanah, Sukkos and Passover, and Met Council operates mobile food pantries and year-round community distributions, along with home deliveries to Holocaust survivors and homebound seniors. Separately, the National School Lunch Program provides kosher lunches to students in 144 schools.
Medicaid Meals and a Broader Push for Food That Fits
Met Council also supports New York's Social Care Network program, which provides medically tailored meals and nutritious groceries to eligible Medicaid members. Per Met Council's Social Care Network, the organization delivers culturally appropriate nutritious food to eligible Medicaid members at no cost. The new facility's conference center will host training sessions and meetings for food pantry partners, community organizations, funders and public agencies.
That emphasis on culturally and religiously appropriate food reflects wider patterns in food assistance. A 2024 survey of 492 people who observe kosher at home and experience food insecurity found that 61% said they would feel more comfortable using a food pantry or community kitchen if it offered more foods meeting their preferences or dietary needs, according to the Orthodox Union. Separately, Food Bank News reported that nearly 21% of participants in New York City's GetFoodNYC emergency food system requested kosher or halal food during the height of the pandemic, and that Met Council had distributed 20 million pounds of food a month to more than 200,000 New Yorkers in the prior year.
For comparison, Food Bank For New York City operates a 90,000-square-foot warehouse at the Hunts Point Cooperative Market in the Bronx, which it describes as sitting at the heart of America's largest food distribution hub of its kind, according to Food Bank For New York City. Met Council's Canarsie facility is considerably smaller in footprint but reflects the same push across the city's emergency food system toward faster logistics and more targeted distribution as demand continues to climb.
