HIV/AIDS service organizations benefit from annual Dining Out for Life

Lemon and ricotta griddlecakes with a glass of fresh grapefruit juice and a side of apple wood bacon for breakfast in Providence. Turkey burger with crumbled blue cheese and sliced apples, a bowl of homemade soup and a fizzy cherry phosphate for lunch in Chicago's Boystown. And filet mignon with wasabi mashed potatoes for dinner and a dessert of salted vanilla ice cream in West Hollywood.

With such culinary enticements, restaurant goers across the country can feast all day long on Thursday, April 29, during Dining Out for Life.

ActionAIDS started Dining Out for Life in Philadelphia in 1991. It is now in 55 cities and 3,500 restaurants in the United States and Canada, generating nearly $4 million annually for AIDS and HIV services. Local HIV/AIDS organizations pay an annual licensing fee of $1,000, but proceeds from the meals -- typically 25 percent of the food bill -- go back to them.

This year will be Boston's first modest step into DOFL, with Cambridge Cares About AIDS receiving 25 percent of the dinner tab from nine local restaurants. Philadelphia's 20th annual DOFL for Action AIDS will involve roughly 200 restaurants throughout the Delaware Valley offering 33 percent percent of their proceeds, and many restaurants offering an additional weekly year-round discount for donations made that evening.

Kathy Power, development manager with Cambridge Cares, said a volunteer with her organization mentioned she had just moved from St. Louis, where DOFL had pulled in nearly a quarter of a million dollars.

"I'm a former restauranteur," she said. "I could see the appeal -- why something like this would seem like a good idea."

Power said many AIDS/HIV organizations had found annual gala fundraisers were not the best use of time.

"We were really just looking for a different way to engage with the community," she said.

Power added the Cambridge event is being promoted with 11 by 17 color posters customized with the name of the neighborhood restaurant.

"Geographically, Boston is not a huge city," she said. "We're hoping the neighborhoods will get involved. It's our first year, so we just just really don't know how much this will; generate. But we have a lot of excitement with our host table captains."

Philadelphia's first event nearly two decades ago was equally as modest. It started with less than two dozen participating restaurants, and it raised around $20,000.

And now?

"It's by far our largest fundraising event event of the year," said Michael Byrne, communications and development director for Action AIDS. "It's our signature event in Philadelphia. It's become a local tradition. it's very important to our bottom line besides being a really fun event. it's easy and everyone can participate. And everyone likes to go out to eat. We make it easy by making sure there are restaurants in all price ranges and all categories."

He said the organization last year pulled in $190,000 from the event.

In addition, 35 restaurants in the Philadelphia-Delaware Valley DOFL are participating in a "20 percent off Tuesday" campaign. For cash donations of $25 made during the meal, a patron will have 20 percent off the tab for his or her entire table every Tuesday for the next year.

"It's a way for us to further thank our restaurants and get people back into the restaurants on what is typically a slow night of the week," said Byrne.

Action AIDS partnered with smaller regional HIV/AIDS organizations to enable them to participate and benefit without having to foot the entire licensing fee. Each restaurant is assigned at least one volunteer from the participating agencies.

Organizations in several large cities, such as Dallas and New York, do not participate in DOFL, typically because their local calendars are already heavily booked around the mandatory date. Others that joined the program before the requirement was established that all cities need to use the same date to make the event hold their event on another date. Washington, D.C., for example, observed DOFL on March 11.

The San Francisco Bay Area DOFL includes more than 150 restaurants in multiple counties. Its primary beneficiary is the Stop AIDS Project, as well as AIDS Project East Bay, Allen Temple Baptist Church AIDS Ministry, California Prostitutes Education Project, HIV Education and Prevention Project, Rainbow Community Center of Contra Costa County, and Women Organized to Respond to Life-threatening Disease.

In Los Angeles, some 40 restaurants will help raise money for Project Angel Food. Chicago's 17th annual DOFL, with 40 restaurants, will benefit AIDSCare Progressive Services.

The Ft. Lauderdale/Miami DOFL, in which several restaurants are also participating in the "20 percent Off Tuesday" program, will benefit Care Resource with proceeds from nine restaurants. Providence's sixth annual DOFL has 21 restaurants and benefits AIDS Project Rhode Island.

Participating cities and restaurants as well as reservations for most of the restaurants are available at the DOFL Web site. Reservations are highly recommended and patrons are urged to bring their checkbooks to make donations.

Byrne said he understands the difficulties cities faced in trying to find sponsors to organize the events. He added, however, having a uniform annual date will make it easier to advertise DOFL as a national event.

His advice to new cities?

"Start where you want to be," he said. "Don't start low and think you're going to get where you want to be later. It's hard to change businesses' minds once you've told them something. We've always asked for 33 percent. If you pack them in, and your turn them, over three times, every restaurant owner loves a full house. The restaurants are a tight community; they know what's happening with each other."

Byrne has actually had the chance to enjoy DOFL as a diner rather than as an organizer for the last couple of years.

"I've gotten a chance to go out and eat at a decent time," he said. "It was great. I enjoyed it immensely. Before I was always eating at 11 o'clock."