Walmart Announces $150,000 Grant to Three Long Island Nonprofit Organizations Including Long Island Cares

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$50,000 Grant to Long Island Cares, Inc. to Develop School Pantries in Collaboration with Brentwood School District

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Brentwood, NY - August 1, 2014 - The Walmart Foundation's New York State Giving Council has awarded $150,000 to three Long Island nonprofit organizations for its second funding cycle of 2014. This funding cycle's "Focused Giving" centers on promoting hunger relief, healthy eating and career opportunities. Walmart donated $50,000 each to Sustainable Long Island, Long Island Cares Inc., and Long Island Council of Churches.
 
"At Walmart, it is our mission and passion to support organizations that work to make a difference in their communities," said Jason Klipa, Director of Public Affairs & Government Relations for Walmart. "We are proud to support the remarkable work of these nonprofits, as we strive to achieve our goal of creating opportunities that will enable families on Long Island to live better."
 
The grant to Sustainable Long Island will support the organization's food equity program; identifying strategies and initiatives to increase access to fresh, affordable food in historically underserved communities across Long Island. Specifically, the funding will be applied to streamline the ongoing success of Sustainable Long Island's youth-staffed farmers' markets through a variety of educational and financial projects. "The Walmart Foundation's funding will enable us to equip staff and customers with knowledge, resources, and skills to lead healthier lives," said Amy Engel, Executive Director of Sustainable Long Island. "The main objective of Sustainable Long Island's program is to not only provide these communities with fresh, affordable produce, but to help them learn more about healthy eating and nutrition in an effort to improve community health."
 
The grant to Long Island Cares, Inc. will help to establish the organization's first Mobile School Pantry, partnered with Brentwood Union Free School District. The Mobile School Pantry program will work to alleviate child hunger through the provision of food to children and families at each of the district's elementary schools.
 
"We're very grateful to Walmart for their continued support of our work," said Paule T. Pachter, Chief Executive Officer of Long Island Cares, Inc. "Walmart has been a consistent and generous corporate partner of Long Island Cares, Inc.-The Harry Chapin Food Bank, and their most recent grant to support our new School Pantry program with the Brentwood School District will enable us to provide critical support to many children who face the challenges of food insecurity on a daily basis."
 
The grant to Long Island Council of Churches will support the organization's mission to provide emergency food assistance to Long Islanders, and will also supply meals for those with special dietary needs required to stay healthy.
 
ABOUT THE WALMART FOUNDATION
Launched in 2008, associate-led State Advisory Councils work with the Walmart Foundation to help identify needs within their state, review grant requests and make funding recommendations to the Foundation. The Walmart Foundation will begin accepting grant applications from New York nonprofit organizations for this year's fourth funding cycle from September 7 until September 13, focusing on areas of education, healthcare access and other human services. Grant submissions
are only accepted online at: www.walmartfoundation.org/stategiving.
 
About Long Island Cares, Inc.
Long Island Cares, Inc. - The Harry Chapin Food Bank is Long Island's first food bank: serving the hungry on Long Island since, 1980.  Long Island Cares brings together all available resources for the benefit of the hungry on Long Island and provides emergency food where and when it is needed, and sponsors a wide variety of innovate direct service programs that help families achieve self-sufficiency. The organization was founded by the late singer, Grammy Award winning songwriter and social activist Harry Chapin in response to the growing issue of hunger on Long Island. It is continued today by his wife and partner Sandy Chapin, a dedicated Board of Directors and talented staff working out of their 35,000 square foot facility in Hauppauge and their storefront hunger assistance centers in Freeport and Lindenhurst. Long Island Cares is a member agency of the Food Bank Association of New York State and Feeding America. Long Island Cares, Inc. is recognized by the NYS Department of Health and the USDA as the regional food bank for Long Island.