Dinner and drinks will toast a bounty of compassion at Project Hospitality’s Harvest Gala this week
By Carol Ann Benanti | benanti@siadvance.com
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. — Project Hospitality’s annual Harvest Gala, set for Wednesday, Oct. 18, will celebrate busy hands, open hearts and generous deeds by Staten Island leaders, volunteers, faith workers, businesses, and philanthropists.
Rev. Louis Jerome, Colleen and Dr. Robert Sorrentino, and Northfield Bank will be lauded along with Kayla O’Callaghan and Assemblyman Charles Fall at the event set for 6 to 8 p.m. at LiGreci’s Staaten on Forest Avenue in West Brighton.
Event co-chairs are Donald Reilly, Dr. Victor Avis and Kim Avis.
Honorary co-chairs are Carol Kelleher, widow of the late Denis P. Kelleher, and Brian J. Laline, executive editor of the Advance.
Committee members are Pam Adamo, Eileen Bernstein, Jay Chazanoff, Alice Diamond, Caroline and Tim Harrison, Mary and Michael McVey, George Passariello, Rev. Dr. Roland and Una Ratmeyer and Sharon Weerth.
Tickets are priced at $150. Visit www.projecthospitality.org or phone 718 448-1944 for sponsorship opportunities that are still available. Joshua Keller at jkeller@projecthospitality.org is also available to contact.
ABOUT THE HARVEST HOME GALA
The event that was co-founded in 1997 by Alice Diamond, widow of Richard E. Diamond, the late publisher of the Advance, and the late Eleanor Proske, an Advance Woman of Achievement and later judge, honors the mission of Project Hospitality by inviting Staten Islanders to contribute funds and support the work of sheltering homeless Staten Islanders.
The annual dinner recalls the practice of “Ingathering” – the act of bringing in the first fruits of the harvest to share with the community.
On October 18th Project Hospitality will harvest the fruits of kindness, care and compassion, as the seasons turns toward winter, the temperatures drop, and homeless persons need shelter more urgently.
Project Hospitality’s honorees represent the best of our borough. Their good deeds have a positive ripple effect on more than 40,000 Staten Islanders who receive food, shelter, recovery services and other life-saving interventions every year from the oldest and largest social safety net in the borough.
Rev. Louis Jerome leads and inspires Staten Island faith communities in service.
Northfield Bank Foundation and Assemblyman Charles Fall have made urgently needed affordable housing possible in the borough through their steadfast support of the newly opened Castleton Houses.
Colleen and Dr. Robert Sorrentino, and Kayla O’Callaghan grew up steeped in the ethic of giving and carry that same generosity into the next generation.
All the honorees give whole-hearted support to the mission of Project Hospitality — a 24-hour-a-day, 365-day-a-year interfaith agency that reaches out to community members who are hungry, homeless or otherwise in need in order to work with them to achieve their self-sufficiency — thereby enhancing the quality of life for our community.
Father Louis Jerome, pastor of Our Lady of Good Counsel – St. Peter – St. Paul & Assumption R.C. Church: Rev. Jerome is a fixture in the lives of thousands of Catholic families across the Island from North Shore to South shore. He will receive theMonsignor Peter (Jerry) Finn Service Above Self Award for a lifetime of service to the Staten Island community.
Dr. Robert and Colleen Sorrentino will receive the Denis Kelleher Memorial Award for Outstanding Contribution to the People of Staten Island for their work in expanding educational opportunities for immigrants at New World Prep Charter School.
The Sorrentinos work tirelessly for the good of Staten Island charities including the Wagner College DaVinci Society, Snug Harbor Cultural Center, the Italian Cultural Foundation.
Mrs. Sorrentino is also a member of the Executive Women’s council of New York.
Most notably she has served on the board of Trustees for New World Prep Charter School and now as treasurer of the Friends of New World Prep Charter School, helping to fundraise capital dollars to build a high school to complete the pre-college education for students for English Language Learners. New World Prep Charter School was co-founded by Project Hospitality and El Centro del Inmigrante.
Northfield Bank & Northfield Bank Foundation will be bestowed with the Richard E. Diamond Memorial Award for Exemplary Commitment to People in Need.
Northfield has deep roots on Staten Island. The bank began on the North Shore in 1887 as a village savings and loan organization and has grown to be an institution with $5.6 billion in assets. Charitable giving continues to be at the heart of its mission.
Charles Fall, Assemblymember 61st District, will receive theCivic Leadership Award.
Elected in 2018 to represent Staten Island’s North Shore in the State Assembly, Fall’s legislative priorities revolve around comprehensive strategies to ensure stable and healthier communities. This includes expanding resources for teachers, parents and students to resolve academic disparities, creating affordable housing options, ensuring individuals and families have sufficient health coverage and access to vital services, improving transportation infrastructure and other long-standing community concerns on the North Shore.
With the city facing an affordable housing crisis of such great magnitude, North Shore Assemblyman Charles Fall and Northfield Bank and the Northfield Bank Foundation have been pillars of support for the creation of the Island’s first mixed affordable and supportive housing project, Castleton Houses.
Thanks in large part to capital funds from the New York State Assembly and a $100,000 grant from Northfield Bank Foundation, Castleton Houses opened this year. The architecturally beautiful, light-filled building enhances the neighborhood of Port Richmond, and is now home to residents of 48 apartments.
Their honoring also points to the need for more dollars to be committed to Staten Islanders at the precipice of becoming homeless – including our elderly, persons with disaiblites and young single families.
Anti-hunger advocate Kayla O’Callaghan will receive an award named in memory of her grandparents, and Project Hospitlity’s co-founders,theMac and Pearce O’Callaghan Award for Social Justice.
A student at Pace University, Kayla O’Callaghan has championed the largest school food drives.
Over dinner and drinks, guests will be moved by a program featuring some of the stories of hope and stories of challenge that Project Hospitality encounters every day serving the borough’s most marginalized, hungry and homeless residents.
Project Hospitality began in 1982 as a simple food pantry, soup kitchen and a place for the unhoused to lay their heads.
Since then, the agency has developed an extensive network of care for Staten Islanders of all walks of life, providing such services as substance use recovery, domestic violence intervention, youth programs, mental health care and HIV/AIDS support.
Project Hospitality serves the wider community with applications for benefits, free tax preparation and was an essential coordinator of vaccines and testing during COVID, and emergency housing and long-term assistance in the wake of Superstorm Sandy.