After a monumental 18 months of overwhelming challenges, North Texas Food Bank is ramping up its annual Harvest fundraiser. Instead of a graze-around evening at an open-air venue, 2021 Co-Chairs Kathryn and Craig Hall and Honorary Chair Liz Minyard are thinking big with a message for a couple of reasons.
First, NTFB’s incredible work during the pandemic continues. Second, Harvest will launch the celebration of NTFB’s 40 years in operation.
To kick things off, NTFB Co-Founders Kathryn and Liz plus Craig are adjusting the event to a seated dinner at the Omni Dallas Hotel on Saturday, September 11.
Next, they’ve arranged to have Feeding America CEO Claire Babineaux-Fontenot as the evening’s speaker.
While NTFB President/CEO Trisha Cunningham rallied North Texans to support those in need of food during the pandemic, Claire was doing the same thing on a national level that earned her a place on Time Magazine’s “Most Influential People of 2020” list.
As the nation’s largest domestic hunger-relief organization, Feeding America “is a nationwide network of 200 food banks and 60,000 food pantries and meal programs.” Considered by Forbes as the second-largest U.S. charity, Feeding America “provides more than 4B meals to more than 46M people across the United States.”
Before joining Feeding America in 2018, Claire, like Trisha, came from the private sector. She “spent 13 years as a part of Walmart’s leadership team with her most recent role being executive vice president and global treasurer.”
It was in 2015 that she left Walmart to “pursue a new path.” The reason for the course change was her breast cancer diagnosis. She wanted to focus on getting healthy and helping people in need.
And just like Trisha, Claire was just settling into her demanding role at Feeding America when the tsunami of need arrived in 2020 with the pandemic.
Among the many who supported Claire during this time was philanthropist MacKenzie Scott, who not only provided “transformational gifts” to 42 of Feeding America’s food banks but surprised Claire with a $20M donation for the national office.
BTW, Claire won’t need a tour of Dallas when she arrives in September. After earning a Bachelor of Science from the University of Louisiana in Lafayette and a Juris Doctor from Southern University Law Center in Baton Rouge, she earned a Master of Laws in Taxation from SMU’s Dedman School of Law.
Trivia note: Claire’s parents, Mary Alice and Warren Babineaux “cared for more than 100 children through a combination of birth, adoption and fostering” and were inducted into the National Adoption Hall of Fame in 2008.
Sponsorship opportunities are available, but they’re being gobbled up pretty quickly.
* Photo provided by North Texas Food Bank