Black History Museum To Break Ground With Obama

A new national museum telling the history of black life, art, and culture will soon begin taking shape as the 19th museum in the Smithsonian Institution to explore stories that have sometimes been left out on the National Mall. President Barack Obama and former first lady Laura Bush will join Wednesday in celebrating the start of construction for the National Museum of African American History and Culture, which comes during Black History Month. The groundbreaking also marks the start of a public fundraising campaign to build the museum. Officials revealed about $100 million has been raised to date in private funds. This includes $5 million gifts from Wal-Mart, American Express, Boeing, Target and UnitedHealth Group. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the Lilly Endowment each gave $10 million in recent years.

Read more at ABC News

Farmers Ending Hunger Receives Walmart Grant

Farmers Ending Hunger has received a $25,000 grant from the Walmart Foundation to support its Farm to Food Box program. The funds will supplement the organization’s efforts to collect and transport almost 2 million pounds of crops and meats from farms to processors then to the Oregon Food Bank Network. Farmers Ending Hunger works with farmers and ranchers, who donate a portion of their harvest, to provide access to high-quality food.

Read more at the Statesman Journal

Birmingham Man Hopes to Hook Customers on New Product

Benny Bliss hopes his product attracts interest and customers – literally. The former director of special markets in education and government for Long’s Electronics in Birmingham has a provisional application for a patent on Magnetic Bliss. Bliss, an Auburn graduate who resides in Birmingham, also said he has entered a Walmart-sponsored contest called Get on the Shelf. “If you win the contest, your product will be placed on shelves at Walmart and also on walmart.com,” he said. “You have to submit a video and we’ve already done that.” According to walmart.com, a two-round public voting process will determine the top three products. The grand prize winner’s product will be sold on walmart.com and will also “get on the shelf” at select Walmart stores across the country.

Read more at The Huntsville Times

Hospital’s ‘Live Well’ Program Receives $25,000 Donation From Walmart Foundation

On Wednesday St. Helena Hospital Clearlake today received a $25,000 contribution to assist with their Live Well program. The grant, which was given to the nonprofit organization through the Walmart Foundation’s State Giving Program, will be used to provide new expanded space for the many educational groups and outside community organizations throughout the Lake County region. The new area will be used as a learning center for group meetings, one of the most important aspects of the Live Well program. “The generosity of Walmart is greatly appreciated,” said Kimberly Tangermann, associate director of family health centers, St. Helena Hospital Clearlake. “The Live Well program values Walmart’s contribution to evolving the health of our community.”

Read more at Lake County News

United Way of the CSRA Receives Tax Assistance Grant

Once again, the United Way of the CSRA has been awarded a Volunteer Income Tax Assistance (VITA) grant. This marks the fourth year the local organization has received the grant. The grant, provided by the Walmart Foundation, helps make sure more taxpayers are informed about the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) and that they have access to free tax filing assistance. By IRS estimates, about 20 percent of eligible individuals and families don’t know they qualify for EITC. EITC is a refundable federal income tax credit for low to moderate income individuals and families.

Read more at WRDW-TV

Café Takes Meals Off Wheels

The menu at the Silver Café, which opened last week, rotates on a daily basis and includes entrees such as chicken cordon bleu, cacciatore, Salisbury steak and Swedish meatballs. And while that may sound like standard fare, this café is unique in Spokane for other reasons: It’s a Meals on Wheels program that leaves the delivery trucks behind with cooks eager to serve up food for people of all ages. “There’s a stigma about Meals on Wheels that it’s not very good food and we’re trying to change that,” said Executive Director Pam Almeida. Meals on Wheels now delivers most of its food to senior centers, but Almeida said that wasn’t reaching some people. A $50,000 grant from Wal-Mart and the Meals on Wheels Association of America allowed Almeida to open the café, with the help of volunteers. The local Meals on Wheels program was one of 20 nationwide to win a grant.

Read more at the Spokesman-Review

Harvest Ministries Holds Special Event to Honor Efforts

Harvest Ministries held a special event for the local Walmart and Sam’s Club stores Monday, honoring their food-banking efforts that in 2011 resulted in 371,789 pounds of food distributed throughout Chaves County. Rubie Rubinstein, pastor of Harvest Ministries, presented team management leaders from each store with certificates that detailed precisely how much food their respective companies donated statewide last year. Walmart and Sam’s Club combined to donate 4,254,000 pounds of food in 2011, which Harvest Ministries estimates is the equivalent of 3,235,000 meals. “Walmart and Sam’s are our big benefactors,” Rubinstein said. “We’re trying to say to them, their management team, that we really appreciate them for what they’ve done to help our community.”

Read more at Roswell Daily Record

Walmart Donates Rs50 lakh to Tami Nadu Cyclone-Hit Farmers

The Walmart Foundation, a division of the world’s largest retailer Walmart, has donated $100,000 (about Rs50 lakh) to farmers in Cuddalore district in Tamil Nadu, who were severely affected by cyclone Thane last year. International humanitarian organization CARE and Walmart Foundation are currently engaged in cashew value chain at the district affected by the December 30 cyclone. Through the donation, the Walmart Foundation and CARE aim to restore livelihoods for farmers involved in the cashew processing sector in Cuddalore, Walmart Foundation said. “Cuddalore has major clusters of large-scale cashew farming and processing activities. The sector employs several thousand marginalized women in cashew cultivation. Through this initiative, we hope to rebuild the capacity of cashew growers and ensure positive, sustainable benefits for families,” Bharti-Walmart Managing Director and CEO, Raj Jain, said. Approximately 3,600 people including 900 businesswomen will benefit from the project, scheduled to be completed by March 2013, it said. The cyclone which devastated eastern India last year, claimed 47 lives, affected around 700 villages, particularly farmlands and rendered many homeless.

Read more at DNA India

Widnes Supermarket Celebrates First Graduates Asda Skills Academy

Staff working at Asda in Widnes are among the first to graduate from the Asda Skills Academy after completing an apprenticeship programme with the supermarket retailer. Graduates from the Asda Skills Academy have successfully completed 12 modules of study designed to develop their retail knowledge and skills, as well as presenting a portfolio of their work to City & Guilds for assessment. Andy Clarke, chief executive and president of Asda, said: “This is a really special day for us. I’m incredibly proud to see our first colleagues graduate from the Asda Skills Academy. Training and qualifications don’t just give people pieces of paper – they give them the confidence to do more than they thought they could. That’s why, at Asda, we don’t just offer our colleagues a job, but provide them with the means and the opportunity to develop their skills and confidence and to build a fulfilling career.” More than 4,200 Asda workers enrolled on the apprenticeship programme when the retailer launched the initiative in June 2011.

Read more at Runcorn and Widnes Weekly News

Let’s Move, She Said — And We Have

(Editor’s Note: The following opinion editorial is written by Dr. Ezekiel J. Emanuel, head of the department of Bioethics at The Clinical Center of the National Institutes of Health and special health care advisor to President Obama.)

During the first spring of the Obama presidency, the First Lady broke ground on a White House vegetable garden. Then, in February 2010, she announced the Let’s Move initiative, a campaign to change the way America’s children eat and exercise, with the goal of ending childhood obesity in a generation. One of the most important results has been increasing public awareness of the importance of obesity. Today, 80 percent of Americans acknowledge that childhood obesity is a serious problem. There has also been important progress in the private sector. Walmart, Walgreens, Supervalu and other smaller grocers have promised to build or expand 1,500 stores that sell fresh fruits and vegetables in communities without access to healthy food. Even more impressive, Walmart announced that, by 2015, it would remove all trans fats and reduce salt and added sugars by 25 percent and 10 percent, respectively, from thousands of packaged foods it sells. We know that when Walmart drops salt by 25 percent, everyone will drop salt by 25 percent, because when Walmart demands suppliers change how they make their products, it drives the whole marketplace. Walmart has also committed to making healthier foods more affordable.

Read more at the New York Times: Opinionator