Happy New Year and welcome to our 17th '1 of 52' Hunger Network Newsletter.
First, a couple of mundane "housekeeping" notes. Due to a long distance carrier snafu, we've lost our toll-free 888 number. Please delete it from your contact notes and use my personal cell phone (listed above) for now. Also, I may sometimes be emailing you from AOL, where our website is hosted, though, please send all email to my endhunger@cox.net address.
Writing the first portion of our 17th edition newsletter will be quite short for me, because the 2nd and 3rd portions have already been written. The 2nd portion is our current news release announcing the expansion of our '1 of 52' concept's scope and scale. The 3rd portion is an important article that was published for us in the 12/12/07 editorial section of the Providence Journal RI's paper of record. It will serve as a real positioning piece and will be widely distributed.
For instance, I will be sending it to the 'One' Campaign to lobby them to look at the '1 of 52' organization concept as a way to multiply their efforts on a community to community basis. We encourage you to join their great 'One' Campaign and utilize those actions as part of our Strength-in-Numbers '1 of 52' concept.
If you happen to be in the Southern New England area, please tune in the Jim Vincent Show this coming Sunday, January 6th at 9 am. I was the guest of Mr. Vincent who was kind enough to dedicate the entire half hour interview to our work. One major note to look for on the show - and on the Feinstein Foundation website www.feinsteinfoundation.org - is that fellow '1 of 52' member Alan Shawn Feinstein has announced his 2008, 11th Annual Million Dollar Challenge. All '1 of 52' members are urged to learn about, and participate in, what has been called "the most successful grassroots campaign to fight hunger of all times".
Please forward this newsletter or any portion along to any-and-all of your contacts. Also, please send us advance notice of your actions / events so we can help publicize them by posting them on our site.
Peace in the New Year, Steve
FOR IMMEDIATE PRESS RELEASE - CONTACT: STEVE MACIEL 401-368-1325
'1 of 52' Hunger Network Expands its Scope and Scale
Since 1988, musicians and artists have been utilizing their talents at the center of a unique grassroots movement to help end hunger called the '1 of 52' Hunger Network. This network has been steadily building for 20 years and currently has chapters operating in 20 of the 50 states. Their initial plan is to have a minimum of 52 members in each state, each member representing one week of the year, who take action in that week to help end hunger. Each united action creates strength-in-numbers in this cumulative action plan. Members get to choose their own actions and participation has ranged from holding food drives at concerts to donations of memorabilia and event proceeds. The '1 of 52' Hunger Network's mission is to help maximize existing hunger agencies by organizing ongoing, mass-scale action through a grassroots strength-in-numbers movement in their support. True to its mission, the network has directed tens of thousands of dollars, tons of food and incalculable awareness to hunger causes locally and nationally.
Network founder Steve Maciel states; "The concept began organizing musicians and artists with tremendous success, and what we quickly found was, that the venues that hosted the events, the corporate sponsors and media that promoted them - and most importantly - the fans that attended, all wanted to know how they could join to help. As a result, we are expanding the scope and scale of the project in major ways. In addition to the traditional musicians and artists - some who will have been participating for 20 years in 2008 - we are now including people from all walks of life to join as '1 of 52' Members. The influence of music and arts will always remain at the center of our concept, and we now extend the invitation to anyone to bring their own special talents in support of our plan to help end hunger. We're confident that the sheer numbers of united member actions, coupled with the network's inherent longevity, will have a lasting impact."
"As well as expanding the scope of the concept, our non-profit 501(c)3 organization has begun to expand its scale also. Once a "critical mass" number of 52 is reached in a state, we will spearhead those to start '1 of 52' chapters into their individual communities. Since we've already exceeded 52 members in our model state of Rhode Island, we'll create the new model here. When just this smallest state in the union's 39 cities and towns reach 52 members, we'll have minimum of 2,028 '1 of 52' members united behind the cause. Just imagine the strength of this network when all 50 states are eventually up-and-running."
Maciel notes: "Taking a united stand, with an organized plan behind us, we can surely bring about the political will needed to return emergency food pantries to their original purpose: emergencies - not a way of life".
We invite you to join our grassroots movement. It costs nothing to become a "1 of 52" Hunger Network member and 100% of all proceeds and actions go directly to the hunger agency of your choice. Visit http://members.aol.com/hungerzero or call 401-368-1325 to learn how you, as an individual, can help us end hunger.
Projo editorial article text:
Time to take hunger 'off the table'
Posted on ProJo.com - 01:00 AM EST on Wednesday, December 12, 2007
By STEPHEN M. MACIEL
In his Oct. 16 Commentary column ("Rhode Island's economic model is a disaster") Deputy Editorial Pages Editor Edward Achorn wrote: "The state's economy is suffering, despite Rhode Island's great advantages of location, beauty and history. . . . A different model is desperately needed -- less crushing, more competitive taxes; and a government focused on the general interest, including the basics of good roads and bridges, good public schools, and help for the neediest."
As president of the Non-Profit 501(c)3 End Hunger Foundation, I'm witnessing a tightening of social services that shows no sign of abating. State deficits, immigration concerns and tax reforms are pressuring local government aid. Global conflicts and environmental issues are straining federal government budgets. Multiple issues are challenging faith-based efforts. Increased housing, utility, fuel, medical and food costs are further tightening consumer budgets.
I foresee "help for the neediest" varying widely and wildly on both supply and demand sides in the immediate future. As a result, the neediest -- including many children and working poor families -- will face further hardships.
The End Hunger Foundation proposes that we collectively prepare for a time when social services may be stretched so thin, that many basic human needs could go unmet. What we must not allow, under any circumstances, is for our neighbors to go without food. Let us literally, as a caring society, take hunger "off the table."
Ending hunger will empower us to more effectively deal with the inevitable hard economic choices to come. As an added bonus, ending hunger is good for the economy! Yes, you read it correctly.
Study, for example, just one aspect of the solution; the federally funded U.S. Department of Agriculture Food Stamp program. According to USDA estimates, every food-stamp dollar redeemed generates an addition 84 cents in economic activity. In 2006, at only a 52-percent participation rate in Rhode Island, this program brought in approximately $11 million per month. That's $6 million in direct spending plus $5 million in additional economic activity. Bringing the state up to 100-percent participation would almost double these numbers.
At a national level, the Harvard School of Public Health estimates that hunger costs the American economy $90 billion annually in preventable health-care costs, lost educational achievement and lower worker productivity. As George McGovern pointed out in his book The Third Freedom: Ending Hunger in Our Time, malnutrition causes much more loss in human productivity than it would cost to end it.
How is this going to happen, keeping in mind that more taxes may not be the answer? Most of the answers already exist -- they simply have not been brought to fruition with enough support behind them. We hope to change that.
In 2004, the National Anti-Hunger Organizations (NAHO) published A Blueprint to End Hunger. This document outlines a comprehensive action plan that would effectively end hunger as we know it in America. Our plan is to help make their plan happen.
Included with this document is the NAHO's Millennium Declaration to End Hunger in America, which states, "Ending Hunger is a two-step process: expanding and improving effective initiatives like public nutrition programs . . . combined with strengthened community-based efforts, has the capacity to feed all in need." The blueprint also includes an open letter from the NAHO detailing exactly what is needed to carry out its "targeted strategy to cut hunger and food insecurity in half by 2010 and to end hunger and food insecurity by 2015." In this letter, they issue "a call to action to every segment of our society to mobilize . . . to make the vision of a hunger-free America a reality" (italics mine).
The End Hunger Foundation answers the NAHO call to action with a plan to help mobilize every segment of our society. We're doing this by expanding a grassroots movement we've been building for almost 20 years to a massive scale. This simple community-based initiative is called the "1 of 52 Hunger Network." Our unique "1 of 52" method of organizing creates consistent statewide progress by matching a minimum of 52 actions with each week of the year.
This strength-in-numbers concept began uniting like-thinkers in Rhode Island in 1988 and has chapters started in 20 of 50 states to date. True to its mission, the network has directed tens of thousands of dollars, tons of food and incalculable awareness to existing hunger agencies locally and nationally. It is our position that the sheer numbers of united member actions, coupled with the network's inherent longevity, will have a lasting impact.
We invite you to join our grassroots movement. It costs nothing to become a "1 of 52" Hunger Network member, and 100 percent of all proceeds and actions go directly to the hunger agency of your choice. Visit http://members.aol.com/hungerzero or call 888-HUNGER-0 to learn how you can help us end hunger in the only place where it possibly can end: in the community.
To quote Martin Luther King Jr., "Why should there be hunger and deprivation in any land, in any city, at any table, when man has the resources and the scientific know-how to provide all mankind with the basic necessities of life?"
Stephen M. Maciel is president of the End Hunger Foundation Inc., in West Greenwich.
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Providence Journal Editorial Article Link:
http://www.projo.com/opinion/contributors/content/CT_maciel12_12-12 07_6N84KRV_v7.2a7780e.html
Peace in the New Year, Steve