Media Alert
Media Contact: Mel Lehman, (212) 865-6115 ML969612921@aol.com
WHAT: New York City CROP Hunger Walk, a two-mile walk down Fifth Avenue to raise funds for local food pantries and kitchen <http://nyccropwalk.org/index.htm
WHEN: April 29, 2007 at 2PM
Registration for walkers begins at 1 PM
WHERE: Fifth Avenue at 90th Street in front of the Church of the Heavenly Rest
WHY: The CROP Hunger Walk will benefit several New York City food pantries and kitchens, including Advent Lutheran Food Pantry and Community Lunch, St. Bartholomewâs Episcopal Community Ministry, St. Maryâs Episcopal Church Soup Kitchen and Food Pantry, Saint Peterâs Lutheran Breakfast Program, Trinity Lutheran Creative Learning Center, Village Church United Methodist Hope for Neighbors in Need, and West Side Campaign Against Hunger.
Background
The hunger walks are an outgrowth of Church World Service efforts to help feed starving people in the devastated post World War II Europe by collecting and shipping grain contributed by farmers in the Midwest. They are the only walks that collect donations for both a local and an international cause. The interfaith effort now attracts thousands of volunteers from local churches, synagogues, and mosques for walks in more than 2000 communities across the nation. Over the past 20 years, CROP Hunger Walkers have raised more than $270 million. Twenty-five percent of all money raised stays in the local communities to help stock local food pantries that provide emergency assistance to families in those neighborhoods. The balance is used to help the New York City-based global humanitarian agency in its efforts to eradicate hunger and poverty around the world. Church World Service www.churchworldservice.org <http://www.churchworldservice.org> is the relief, development and refugee assistance agency of 35 Protestant, Orthodox and Anglican denominations in the United States.