Palomas Summer Feeding Program Starts Third Year

By Victoria Tester

On Monday, June 13, Esperanza Lozoya and  volunteers distributed 500 meals to children in the Main Plaza in Palomas, Chihuahua, on the first day of what will be a four-week summer meal program. This is the third year Lozoya has distributed child summer meals in Palomas.

Many of the children remaining in Palomas are extremely thin, and the need for food in what Lozoya has called “a true humanitarian crisis” in Chihuahua, remains dire.
 
So far this spring 2012, she and volunteers not only held the huge annual Easter egg hunt in the Main Plaza, but thanks to the generosity of a donor church in Las Cruces, have fitted more than 600 children in Palomas and Colonia Modelo and other areas of rural Chihuahua with new shoes. Lozoya will soon take shoes to nearby Colonia Guadalupe Victoria to serve children there, and to other places in rural Chihuahua as well, until all 1000 pairs of donated shoes have been distributed.

At Western New Mexico University this spring, a successful school supply drive on behalf of Lozoya’s work in Palomas was held again by Dr. Alexandra Neves in the School of Education. Other schools and universities are urged to host drives. All school supplies and registrations gathered will aid Palomas children to attend school. Eight basic first aid kits are also needed for women who have been trained to aid their extremely poor rural communities in health care in rural Chihuahua. In the La Luz de La Esperanza Palomas Outreach building on Buenaventura street in Palomas, a daily meal continues to be offered to those aged 60 and over, and to the disabled. For most of the elderly served, this is their only meal of the day.

Visitors to the Outreach building are welcome, and donations for the senior meal are badly needed. Individuals, organizations and churches interested in sponsoring a senior meal at 10 dollars a month, or who can donate fresh or preserved food, are urged to come forward. Donations are also accepted at Diaz Farms in Deming, and at the Food Basket stores in Silver City and in Bayard. This spring marks the second anniversary of all three donation barrels.

Lozoya, who is glad to be in the ninth year of her humanitarian work in Palomas, is also in emergency need of a “new” used truck or van, to keep her work going optimally.

 I act as a U.S. coordinator on behalf of the work of Esperanza Hope Lozoya, who is often travelng in rural Chihuahua. I hope you will come forward to aid the work of this remarkable woman whose strength, courage and dedication to the poor are bringing hope to the crisis situation at the Mexico border.

Non-Perishable Food Drop Off Locations in Southwest New Mexico:

In Deming: at DIAZ FARMS. 

In Silver City:  at both FOOD BASKET grocery stores, the one in Silver City and the one in Bayard.