Irish soup kitchens plan expansion as homelessness crisis worsens By Nick Bramhill

A number of established soup kitchen operators in Ireland are planning to significantly expand their services and open up new food banks in the New Year in response to an increase in poverty-stricken households and homelessness. Some voluntary organizations have said the unprecedented demand for free meals and food parcels over the past year has stretched their resources to the limit. The Irish Soup Kitchens Centres, which runs 365-days-a-year operations in Drogheda, Co. Louth, and Navan, Co. Meath, said it's planning to open up four more outlets in Dublin in 2017. The charity's two centers already dish out up to 3,000 meals in total per week, along with sending out more than 500 food parcels on a weekly basis. Mark O'Neill, spokesman for the service, said, "The situation out there is desperate for an awful lot of people at the moment, and we've identified a big need for more soup kitchens in Dublin. We did a sandwich run in Dublin recently and the number of people we fed who were lying out in shelters and on the streets was unreal. “The homeless numbers are far worse than the official figures the government tells us – and unfortunately that problem is not going to just disappear overnight." It's a similarly grim picture at St. Clare’s Hospitality Food Kitchen in Carlow town, which began handing out free dinners three days a week, along with regular food parcels to the needy after it was set up by a local parish priest 18 months ago. Susan McWey, treasurer of the charity, said the service was recently expanded to a four-day a week operation, and will be increased to a five-day service early in the coming weeks due to the ever-increasing demand. "The people that need us are hungry every day, not just three days a week, so that's why the service has to be expanded. It's very sad that so many people need us, and it affects all walks of life,” McWey said. Brother Kevin Crowley of the Capuchin Day Centre in Dublin said the number of meals they now hand out on a daily basis has doubled since 2009. And he said a visible increase in child poverty in more recent times has resulted in an increase in financially-crippled mothers turning to service for baby food and diapers. Irish Central

Children’s jog raises hundreds for charity

A sponsored jog on the grounds of Victoria House Nursery, Victoria Road, Douglas, raised £1,400, which was split between Housing Matters and Save the Children. Children from the age of two took part. Housing Matters is a local charity that provides advice, guidance and support for those in housing crisis. IOM Today
Housing Matters Save The Children

Charity duck race for hearing-impaired children to be staged Sept. 10 in Bucharest

Photo Credit: Rotaract Triumph

A charity race for children with hearing impairment or loss, called the "Rotaract Triumph Duck Race", will be staged in Bucharest City on September 10. Organisers say in a press statement released on Tuesday that 5,000 rubber ducks will compete on Dambovita River in a race that will change the lives of children with hearing impairment or loss. In Romania, there are nearly 400 children born each year with hypoacusis, with 15 percent of them suffering from severe hearing loss. Children diagnosed with hypoacusis will hear sounds from the environment very faintly or [not] at all. "Besides its medical effects, hypoacusis has serious consequences on the emotional wellbeing of children in their families — the children do not know the sound of their parents' voices — and in society — as these children become timid and withdrawn, unable to express themselves and display emotions in the most natural way possible, thus being captives in a world of silence. Many of them stand very great chances of recovery, but everything is conditional upon an essential requirement: wearing hearing aids. Even a child with severe hearing loss can learn how to speak if he or she has a hearing aid and is in an environment conducive to recovery," the statement reads. Rotaract Bucharest Triumph, the organiser of the charity race, is inviting people to get involved in the project by sponsorships or donations or by taking part in the race. Racers can register for the run online at www.cursaderatuste.ro, with a 10-lei donation allowing running one duck. There is no limit to the acquirable ducks. AGERPRES (RO — author: Madalina Cerban, editor: Andreea Rotaru; EN — author: Corneliu-Aurelian Colceriu, editor: Simona Klodnischi) Photo credit: Rotaract Triumph
AGERPRES

Rose Broome uses crowdfunding to offer hope to homeless By Kevin Fagan

Rose Broome is a techno-nerd. Proudly so. She also agonizes emotionally about the homeless. Proudly so. She sees no disconnect there, contrary to stereotypes of uncaring, young and well-off techies. And she has put proof to that lack of disconnect by founding — and taking to wild success — one of the more compassionate technological enterprises to emerge in recent years to help the penniless. Three years ago, 34-year-old Broome invented a crowdfunding program to raise money tailored to individual homeless people. She called it HandUp, and to date, it has helped 1,637 people with more than $1.07 million funneled through her site — and she’s just getting started. “I don’t have all the answers; I have a lot of questions,” said Broome, whose innocent-seeming sincerity belies the steely, no-nonsense interior of someone who knows how to hammer home deals. “But as a person who has worked in tech, I have seen how new ideas are nurturing and encouraging.” For acting on that conviction, Broome has been nominated for the second annual Visionary of the Year award, sponsored by The Chronicle and St. Mary’s College of Economics and Business Administration. Some people need dentures. Others need glasses or security deposits for moving indoors — the sort of things someone who is down and out needs to get up and running in life. And as they fill those needs, donors get to follow their progress online. It’s a double-feel-good loop. Clients are found through case managers who help the needy, and donations are processed through organizations such as Project Homeless Connect so that they are sure to go to the need delineated. The organization started out in San Francisco and is still based there, but it has expanded around the nation to locations including Detroit, Oregon and Utah. At the time, Broome was working as a data analyst for a self-improvement startup, offering games to help people cope with sickness or lose weight. Four months later, with the help of hackathon buddies Zac Witte and Sammie Rayner, HandUp was born. It took months of fishing for startup money before she caught the ear of angel investor Jason Calacanis. He gave her $35,000, which was enough to get up and running. Soon investors from Ron Conway, who nominated her for the award, to Salesforce.com CEO Marc Benioff were weighing in, and she was well on her way. “I’m a New York and Los Angeles transfer, and I’d moved to San Francisco and was in complete shock at what I saw here on the streets,” Calacanis said. “So when I met Rose I was really intrigued. “Rose is an amazing person, and what she started changed my life,” said Ronnie Goodman, 55, who gained national attention as an artist and competitive runner while living in a tent in San Francisco for five years. Goodman moved indoors in December after he got more than $3,000 in move-in costs through HandUp. “What I got was not charity, not a handout,” Goodman said. “It was a belief in what I was doing — belief in helping people up, giving them a hand. It’s beautiful.” SFGATE Photo

The Malala Fund

The Malala Fund co-founders, Malala Yousafzai Nobel Peace Prize Winner 2014, and Malala's father, Ziauddin Yousafzai, U.N. Special Advisor on Global Education

 

We Amplify

the voices of the girls to keep them in the spotlight, inspire girls globally and drive action on girls’ issues by the global community.

 

We Advocate

at the international, national and local level for policy and system changes that give girls access to a high quality education at a community level.

 

We Invest

in community centered scalable solutions that provide quality education with potential for systems level change by empowering local leaders and educators.
The Malala Fund invests in early stage or small organizations that are led by local leaders. We make grants that help organizations scale their impact to lead to systems level change in the country. We believe in the power of local leaders and entrepreneurs and aim to support and amplify their work through our partnerships.
Pakistan

The Malala Fund currently funds work providing quality education and communities of support to girls who were in exploitive child domestic labor.

Nigeria

We support "safe space" projects for schoolgirls and provide mentoring and support to girls who were married young and have no opportunity to go to school.

Jordan

Informal education programs engage Syrian refugee children in Northern Jordan who have dropped out of school or are at risk of dropping out of the learning process completely.

 

Kenya

The Malala Fund works with partners to provide funding for school expansion and infrastructure so more girls can receive quality education.

 

We believe in the power of advocacy to mobilize resources at scale.

 

Our initial advocacy work also includes supporting the Global Partnership for Education replenishment of $4 billion to get all children into school, the Bring Back Our Girls campaign in Nigeria, and the launching of the youth resolution at the United Nations.

Red Cross seeks $1.68 billion for 2015 to help civilians in armed conflicts By AP

GENEVA – The International Committee of the Red Cross is asking donors for $1.68 billion next year to help people caught up in armed conflicts, its biggest request ever and 25 percent larger than the current budget. ICRC President Peter Maurer says the budget reflects the needs of people suffering from the changing nature of armed conflicts and other violence. He told reporters Thursday at the organization's headquarters in Geneva that "new kinds of crises, in new combinations, often with a regional dimension" are expanding costs and needs in many places. He says Syria remains the largest Red Cross operation, followed by South Sudan, Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia, Congo, Israel and the occupied territories, Mali, Central African Republic and Ukraine. Fox News ICRC