Sunday 3 July 2011

Appreciating our supporters

The Rotary Club of Alfriston, Auckland, NZ held an “Appreciation meeting” recently to bring together all those individuals and companies who have donated goods, money etc throughout the last year with the organisations and individuals who have benefitted from the club’s activities.  This was a first for the club and was run by Proud President Ken Haines using a power point presentation which gave graphic displays of all the fundraising events, the donors for each event plus the recipients of moneys raised where appropriate.  All the Clubs other activities were also included in the presentation.
Over 28 visitors were present plus the 15 members and partners.
Neither the donors nor recipients appreciated just how much the club has done in the community and were staggered to learn that the club raised over $33,000 (including grants from various Rotary Trusts) which was returned mostly to their local community.
President Ken presented the Counties Manukau Police with a laptop computer plus projector and other accessories to help them expand their running of the DARE (Drug Awareness Resisistance Education) programme in local schools.  He also presented a very large cheque to South Auckland Health Foundation for the purchase of Tympstar equipment which will be used to test for middle ear disease in both children and adults and especially babies.
Other recipients included a 93 year old lady swimmer who will be representing New Zealand in the FINA games in Italy in 2012, a young woman who has been self funding visits to Cambodia to teach organisations and children the fundamentals of finance, a high school for equipment to establish a chess club, various other Rotary youth programmes, The Rotary Foundation and the Christchurch Earthquake Appeal.
18 Certificates of Appreciation were presented to donors and several indicated they would like to consider more seriously the opportunity to join the Club.
It was an exciting evening with a lot of fun and well worth the effort of getting everyone one together.  All the donors present guaranteed their continued participation with the Club.
Submitted by IPP Ken Haines, Rotary Club of Alfristin, District 9920, http://www.alfriston.rotarysouthpacific.org/