Neighborly Care Network Receives $2,000 Grant for March for Meals CampaignST. PETERSBURG - Neighborly Care Network announced that they have been awarded a $2,000 grant from the Meals on Wheels Association of America (MOWAA) in recognition of their 2007 March for Meals campaign. MOWAA announced the grant July 16 and will award the grant money on August 31 at the MOWAA Annual conference in Fort Worth, Texas. Mayors for Meals is a component of March for Meals that utilizes the involvement of local mayors. In Pinellas County, seven mayors and one councilmember joined over 900 mayors nationwide in delivering meals on March 21. They included: Mayor Rick Baker, St. Petersburg; Councilmember John Doran, Clearwater; Mayor Bill Mischler, Pinellas Park; Mayor Michael Yakes, Gulfport; Mayor Dick Holmes, S. Pasadena; Mayor Ward Friszolowski, St. Pete Beach; Mayor James Lawrence, Indian Shores; and Mayor Muriel Whitman, Kenneth City. WellCare helped sponsor the event, furnishing T-shirts, shoe horns/back scratchers, and emergency flashlight/radios for volunteers. Neighborly was fortunate to also partner with the Pinellas County Health Department and their Florida on the Move and Step Up! Pinellas County Campaigns. The program is a call to action: Move More and Eat Wisely. This call to action fits in with Neighborly's own mission of health, wellness and independent living for individuals and their families. They provided pedometers for those participating in the event and Walking Logs to record each mayor's steps. This was only one step in a three-month effort to increase the activity level of Neighborly's senior diners and volunteers. March for Meals is an annual national campaign, in which Neighborly Care Network is a participant, to raise awareness of senior hunger, and to encourage action on the part of the local community. Senior nutrition programs across the United States promote March for Meals in their local communities through public events, partnerships with local businesses, volunteer recruitment and fundraising initiatives. The campaign takes place in the month of March because it was during this month that the law was enacted to include senior meal programs in the Older Americans Act. Neighborly Care Network is a private, nonprofit organization dedicated to helping the homebound elderly in Pinellas County since 1966. In 1968, Neighborly initiated the first federally funded Meals on Wheels program in the United States. For more information on how you can participated in the 2008 "Mayors for Meals" event or how you can become a volunteer for Neighborly Care Network, contact Sandi Narron at 573-9444, ext. 203.
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