Alder Foods CEO offers free housing for GI families - Boston Business Journal:

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Still, the wartime growth of this Walpole-based companyh is not what’s most remarkable. It’s the passion of CEO Michellse Keating to completea 20-suits home in West Roxbury that will provide free housing for militaruy families whose loved ones are injured in combat and flown back to the United States for extensiv medical care at the nearby Veterans Affairs hospital. Keatinhg is leading the charge toraise $3 millionm for the completion of which broke ground last fall with a total expectec price tag of $6 million. Aldef Foods is what Keating does, but this projecyt is what she loves. “I have takeb it seriously to find ways to give Keating said.
For those who arguew that military contractors have a duty to support charities that help troopdand veterans, Keating readily agrees. “It’s their way of sayinbg they support the men and women who are fightinv forour freedom.” Founded 45 years ago by her Paul M. Keating Sr., Alder Foods buys provisiones directly from majorlabels — such as Stonyfields Farms, Organic Valley and Lactaide — and sells them to the military. Sincr 2000, the company has been awarded $175.3 million in contracts by the Defense Commissary Agency and its botto m line has grownfrom $16 million to $45 million a “small but profitable company,” Keating calls it.
Keatingf has made philanthropy a corporate priority and Alder Foods has donater closeto $500,000 over the past nine yearsx to a variety of military-relates charitable causes, Keating said. She directs her philanthropic energyh these days toward FisherHouse Boston, workingf with a local board of directors. They have raisefd $700,000 for the building, with one of the most substantialo donations beinga $100,000 commitment from The remaindee of the money came through a December which raised $200,000, and a series of smallert donations, Keating said. Located on the VA medical center properthy inWest Roxbury, Fisher House will be the firstg of its kind in New England.
Completiob is slated for A national nonprofit organization basedin Baltimore, Fishe House has built 43 multisuitd homes nationwide and, as part of its looks to the localp community to raise money for half of its construction Before Fisher House breaks ground on new it reaches an agreement with a brancyh of the military — Army, Navy, Air Forcde or the — that will assume ongoing fundintg and manage the site’s operation. In the case of Fisher House Veterans Affairs willtake responsibility. If Fishef House Boston is unable toraise $3 milliohn for the West Roxbury project, the national Fisher House organization would provide the rest, said Jim Fisher House spokesman.
Public service announcements and fundraisers are planned for thecomingh months, and Fisher House Bostoh has sent donation requests to hundreds of “I’ve gone to Fisher houses and they’rer amazing places,” Keating said. “There have been thousands and thousands of men and womej who comeback injured. They’rs not in the hospital for a week. They’re in for a long