PhillyTablet Inquirer Daily News
Mobile
Home Delivery
philly.com
email
font size
comments
0
options
 
Saturday, October 31, 2009

Let someone else walk in your shoes
If you've purchased new shoes, share with others.

Here’s a good reason to clean out your closet and help a worthy cause.

Philadelphia Sports Club is collecting new and gently worn shoes for Soles4Souls, a Nashville-based nonprofit that depends on the generosity of footwear companies and the public to recycle shoes for the needy.
 
With Americans hoarding an estimated 1.5 billion pairs of unused shoes, no need to wait to make space in cluttered closets. Let someone less fortunate walk in your shoes.
 
The shoes will be refurbished and shipped around the nation and world to natural-disaster victims and those living in extreme poverty.
 
The campaign was started by Wayne Elsey, who was motivated to organize a footwear relief effort after seeing a single shoe wash ashore after the 2004 tsunami in the Indian Ocean. When Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast a year later, Elsey tapped friends in the shoe business, who sent more than one million pairs.
 
Since then, the charity has given away more than 5.5 million pairs of shoes in the United States and 125 other countries, including Kenya and Thailand.
 
Shoes may be dropped off at the Philadelphia Sports club in Chalfont until Nov. 15, when the drive culminates with a “Phillyfit Bash.” Visit www.giveshoes.org to find other participating locations.
Posted by Inquirer Editorial Board @ 6:00 AM  Permalink | Post a comment
Comments   


0 comments
About The Inquirer Editorial Board
Welcome. You're reading the Inquirer Editorial Board's Say What? opinion blog. We hope you enjoy commentary from the Editorial and Commentary pages, in addition to up-to-the-minute opinion postings that appear here for the first time. Here are thumbnail bio sketches and contact information for the editors and writers who produce the newspaper's opinion pages, as well as an archive of recent cartoons by Tony Auth. (Our blog roll follows the ad below.) Please check out the videos from our One Great Idea project. And don't miss our daily online reader polls.
Join on Facebook    Follow on Twitter

Advertise Here