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Valrico Boy Ends 280-Mile March For Homeless Youths

COLIN HACKLEY / The Tampa Tribune

Zach Bonner, 10, poses for a photo Monday outside the Capitol after completing his 280 mile walk from Seffner to Tallahassee.

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By CATHERINE WHITTENBURG | The Tampa Tribune

Published: November 26, 2007

Zach Tracker

TALLAHASSEE - Zach Bonner showed no sign of fatigue this morning as he spoke on the steps of the old state Capitol, the end point of his 280-mile march from Tampa to Tallahassee to raise awareness of youth homelessness.

"The hardest part was whenever it was pouring down rain," said the 10-year-old fourth-grader from Valrico, who began his walk Nov. 3. "I just put on my rainsuit on kept walking through it."

Bonner arrived in Tallahassee on Thanksgiving and ate dinner at a local restaurant with his mother, Laurie, and members of the area's Big Bend Homeless Coalition. He walked the final mile down Apalachee Parkway to the steps of the old Capitol at 8:30 a.m. today accompanied by his mother, his 20-year-old sister, Kelley, and a group of volunteers.

Zach Bonner got the idea for his project after watching a documentary about Mildred Norman Ryder, the "Peace Pilgrim" who walked more than 25,000 miles for nearly three decades to promote peace. But it was the resolution that Congress passed in August, declaring November as National Homeless Youth Awareness Month, that convinced Bonner to undertake his project this fall.

When he first announced his plans to his family, "I thought he was crazy," said his mother, who walked nearly the entire way with her son. "That's a long way to go. It was about 13 miles a day. … He said I've got to do something big. Originally, he said he was going to go from Fort Lauderdale to Tallahassee. I said, well, maybe Tampa to Tallahassee might be a little easier."

Zach Bonner said nights were spent in a donated RV. A student of the online Florida Virtual Academy, he was able to study ahead and do work intermittently on the road to avoid missing schoolwork.

Bonner's homelessness walk is far from his first charitable project. He began his volunteer career at age 6, when he collected donations of food and other supplies from his neighbors after Hurricane Charley. Last year, he collected donations to give Christmas presents to child victims of Hurricane Katrina who are still living in Federal Emergency Management Agency trailers. He has received accolades from President Bush as well as former President Clinton and was named a Point of Light by former Gov. Jeb Bush.

He stopped in this morning at Gov. Charlie Crist's office but was informed that Crist was out of town. On his way out, Bonner asked a governor's aide to pencil him in for a meeting next year on Nov. 1, when he plans to walk from Tallahassee to Atlanta for Habitat for Humanity.

"I'm going to raise enough money to build a house," he said.

"He's my hero," said Kay Freeman, executive director of the Big Bend Homeless Coalition.

Reporter Catherine Dolinski can be reached at (850) 222-8382 or cdolinski@tampatrib.com.

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