The Stacy Zallie Foundation has been featured in a column in the Courier Post (New Jersey):
Shattered by daughter's death, a father finds purpose.
If it's true hindsight is 20/20, then George J. Zallie's vision never has been sharper.Read the rest here.
But his heart is in pieces.
Zallie's daughter and youngest child, Stacy, took her own life in October 2002, almost a year after having an abortion she kept from her close-knit family.
Zallie is convinced the resulting emotional roller coaster led to her death, days before she was to be a bridesmaid in her older brother's wedding.
"I knew it was a life event for her," says Zallie, 53. ". . . It was the most serious issue in that brief life of hers. I know, in my heart, it took a toll on her emotionally and mentally, that she couldn't recover from it. And it just breaks my heart that she didn't open up."
So Zallie put his shattered heart, his prominent name -- he's the second-generation owner of eight area ShopRites -- and his financial clout behind a Web portal and foundation in his daughter's name that provides post-abortion support and advice.
The Cherry Hill resident immersed himself in research on the emotional after-effects of abortion and heard both sides of the great divide, committing to neither one. (For the record, Zallie family campaign contributions over the last several years have gone to Democrats and Republicans alike.).
The Stacy Zallie Foundation