Project Bread, the state’s leading antihunger organization, released numbers from its upcoming annual status report on hunger in the Commonwealth. The disquieting trends described in this report, caused by high unemployment, point to 554,000 people in the Commonwealth struggling with hunger. Food insecurity has found its way into middle class suburbs and has driven low-income people further into crisis. The report argues for a public health approach and asks that the state continue to bring systemic solutions to scale — especially healthy school and summer food programs for kids.

WBUR reports that yesterday's announced drop in statewide unemployment numbers - the first in two years - actually masks a record number of underemployed people, i.e., people who have taken part-time jobs because they can't find full-time work.

And that's not a good thing, the Boston Business Journal reports.

Sarah Schweitzer of the Globe reports how the depressed economy of Lawrence is affecting people there.

EastBoston.com posts a statement from Italia Unita that it's calling off the annual festival because of the current economic climate:

... Due to the current economic climate locally and nationally, Italia Unita has been unable to secure financial commitments from corporate sponsors, grant funding and donations. In addition, the expenses associated with operating the three (3) day festival have also increased, averaging between $80,000 - $90,000. Italia Unita also has outstanding financial commitments from 2008 that have not been fulfilled. ...

The group hopes to bring the event back for 2010.

Via Jimbo.

Dunkin Donuts has launched a $10 million marketing campaign to promote donuts as affordable comfort food in this economic climate, the Herald reports.

Jeff Darcy reports that he and pretty much everyone else who worked at SiCortex in Maynard was laid off yesterday:

... Right now I’ll just say this: in many of the ways that are important to me as an engineer, SiCortex succeeded. Yeah, that's right. We set out to do something very difficult and risky - to place a bet on computing that's characterized by energy efficiency, high density, fast communication and high processor counts instead of raw single-thread performance - and we made it work. We made it work technically, and we made it work in the market. ...

The only failure that mattered was not technical, nor in any area of customer-oriented execution: it was purely a matter of finance and timing. There is every reason to believe that our next system based on our next chip was going to be awesome, pushing our flagship system well into the Top 500 even before we talk about linking them together, and development was well along. Unfortunately, such development is not cheap and that put us in a high-burn-rate phase right when the economy turned sour and capital became very scarce. That's like a "perfect storm" combination of circumstances. ...

The hole in the middle of the city where Filene's used to be is supposed to be a sparkling new retail, office and condo tower someday. This week on www.radioboston.org, we're remembering when Downtown Crossing was where you went to find deals, when you didn't necessarily have the banq for Newbury Street. And we're asking what you'd like to see developed there.

The Fenway Community Development Corp. ponders that question at its annual meeting on Monday, May 11.

Barry Bluestone from Northeastern, Beth Israel Deaconess COO Eric Buehrens and Amaad Rivera, the racial wealth divide initiative leader at United For a Fair Economy, will discuss.

It's 6 to 8:30 p.m. at the new Fenway Health Center, 1340 Boylston St.

Folio reports that Boston/Framingham-based IDG today cut 8% of its US staff and smushed all of its business-to-business publications into a single unit. This comes atop 10% pay cuts for B2B employees last month.

Paul Conley (who actually broke the story), discusses.

Ed note: If anybody needs to hire an outstanding online video and audio editor suddenly free of his previous responsibilities, let me know.