Bio
Kathleen Curran - Acting Domestic Policy Director of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops.
Tony Hall - Three times nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize, Ambassador Tony P. Hall is a leading advocate for hunger relief programs and improving human rights conditions in the world. In February 2002, President George W. Bush asked him to serve as the United States Ambassador to the United Nations Agencies for Food and Agriculture. He was confirmed by the U.S. Senate and sworn in by Secretary of State Colin Powell in September 2002.
Prior to entering the diplomatic corps the Dayton, Ohio native represented the Third District of Ohio in the U.S. House of Representatives for almost twenty-four years, their longest serving representative in history. During his tenure, he was chairman of the House Select Committee on Hunger and the Democratic Caucus Task Force on Hunger. He founded and was one of two House members on the steering committee of the Congressional Friends of Human Rights Monitors. He authored legislation that supported food aid, child survival, basic education, primary health care, micro-enterprise, and development assistance in the world’s poorest countries. Ambassador Hall also founded and chaired the Congressional Hunger Center, a non-governmental organization committed to ending hunger through training and educational programs for emerging leaders.
A founding member of the Select Committee on Hunger, Mr. Hall served as its chairman from 1989 to 1993. During this time, he initiated legislation enacted into law to fight hunger-related diseases in developing nations. He sponsored a successful 1990 emergency measure to assist state-run Women, Infants and Children (WIC) programs. Mr. Hall helped to establish a clearinghouse that provided food through gleaning, a process of gathering grains and produce left on the ground after harvesting. Mr. Hall has worked to promote micro-enterprise to reduce joblessness. In response to the abolishment of the Hunger Committee in April 1993, he fasted for 22 days to draw attention to the needs of hungry people in the United States and around the world.