Eat a bowl of soup and help a hungry child.

        Really, you can do that by attending the third annual Empty Bowl fund-raiser for Kids Cafe from 4-7 p.m. Nov. 4 at the Baker-Hunt Foundation, 620 Greenup St., Covington.

        The fund-raiser is sponsored by the Clay Alliance, a nonprofit organization of local potters. Ceramic bowls that the artisans created are donated for the event, and the $18 admission includes one of the bowls.

        Customers then take the bowls and fill them with a variety of soups prepared by local restaurants. Each participant may keep the bowl ..

        “The purpose of the program is to do something for childhood hunger,” said Mary Sehlhorst, coordinator of Kids Cafe. “We get repeat customers each year. It is a good fund-raiser, plus the artisans get together and share ideas about pottery.”

        Kids Cafe sites are at:

        • Our Daily Bread, Race and Findlay Streets, Over-the-Rhine.

        • St. Bernard parish, 740 Circle Ave., Winton Place.

        • Three Square Music Foundation, 3303 Beekman Ave., Millvale.

        • Washington United Church of Christ, 2950 Sidney Ave., Camp Washington.

        • Literacy in Northern Kentucky, 2500 Todd St., City Heights Housing Community, Covington.

        • Newport Church of God, 401 Keturah St., Newport.

        • The Healing Place Church of God, 522 Fifth Ave., Dayton, Ky.

        Statistics show that in 1999, 12 million children in the United States suffered from hunger. Ms Sehlhorst said one in five people in a soup kitchen line is a child.

        “We try to give kids in low-income neighborhoods at least one nutritious meal a day,” Ms. Sehlhorst said.

        She said 30,000 meals were served last year to children in low-income neighborhoods at local Kids Cafe sites.

        “This is a 66 percent increase over the previous year,” Ms. Sehlhorst said.

        Kids Cafe offers: proper nutrition and personal hygiene, homework help, tutoring life skills, sports, drill team, praise dance, as well as anti-drug and violence programs.

        Ms. Sehlhorst said 1,500 children attended local Kids Cafe sites at least one time last year.

        The Flower Box program in Over-the-Rhine received a boost from Fifth Third Bank. The bank presented Marge Hammelroth, director of the Over-the-Rhine Foundation, with a $25,000 check for the program.

        “This will help us to continue the program,” Mrs. Hammelroth said. “We need the funds.”

        She said the program was started after the April 10-11 riots this year, which were mostly concentrated in Over-the-Rhine, following the shooting of an unarmed black man by a Cincinnati police officer.

        “We felt the riots gave us a black eye. That is when we started the flower box program,” Mrs. Hammelroth said.

       Allen Howard's “Some Good News” column runs Monday-Friday and Sundays. Contact him at (513) 768-8362; at ahoward@enquirer.com; or by fax at (513) 768-8340.
       

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