Project Bread’s 45th annual Walk For Hunger.

On May 5th I will be participating in Project Bread’s 45th annual Walk For Hunger, a 20-mile trek around the Greater Boston area that promotes awareness of hunger in our communities. Last spring, I joined 43,000 walkers, and together we raised $3.6 million. For those of you who don’t know, Project Bread supports a wide variety of programs across the commonwealth of Massachusetts, including community-based meal programs, early childhood and school nutrition initiatives, creating better access to fresh local food resources, and more.

Since 2005, there has been a 23% increase in public assistance requests made to the Greater Boston Food Bank. This figure is significant, especially when you consider that our nation’s food industry is prolific enough to feed every person in this country 3,900 calories each day. Though our food culture is one foregrounded by notions of ‘excess’ and of ‘plenty,’ thousands of people are forced to choose between food and rent, food and heat, and food and healthcare. And this problem doesn’t just affect adults — according to the GBFB, more than 125,000 children are at risk of going hungry on any given day in eastern Massachusetts alone.

The solutions to these problems are deeply entrenched in the political and economic obstacles that engender them; because we live in a society in which food is not a scarcity, tackling the issue of hunger means addressing the systemic problems that prevent safe, nutritional food from reaching the members of the community who need it the very most. But it also means taking small baby steps, such as the ones I’ll take in May. It means raising money, it means raising awareness, and it means keeping this crucial conversation going. We have to do everything we can.

This year, I am setting a fundraising goal of just $500, and I hope that you will please consider contributing. A donation of just $25 provides a hot meal for 40 individuals at a supper program. $50 helps a family purchase $100 of fresh produce with their SNAP benefits at a farmers’ market. If you are unable to contribute, please consider joining the walk yourself, or become a volunteer — and help raise awareness for this great cause.

Please donate to my walk now at by clicking the “Sponsor me” button on my page here. Please also consider sharing this link with anybody you think might be interested in contributing.

Thank you!