It’s been a successful year thanks to such great Rossland community support for Rotary Club fundraisers and events.
The club donated over $24,000 to Rossland students, programs, and community projects this past year and about $2,500 to international projects to help prevent disease, provide clean water, sanitation, and improving basic education and literacy in our global community. We created or participated in a dozen fundraising events and organized nearly 10 local work parties, projects and support for local events. We raise funds and/or donate services by parking cars, tending bar, providing event security, doing small construction/painting projects.
Local donations included $5,500 to the Youth Area Network (for furnishings), $4,000 to Friends of the Rossland Range (for interpretive signage in the fire lookout on top of Old Glory), $3,283 to Rossland Public Library (for a conference room table), $1,793 to send a student to Adventures in Citizenship in Ottawa (co-sponsored by Nelson and District Credit Union), about $1,300 for the youth exchange program to sponsor one student here December through February and to send two students to Sweden and France, $1,000 to two graduating student recipients of the Mike Pistak Memorial Rotary Scholarship Bursary, $5,000 to Rossland Skatepark (final payment of $20,000 commitment), $1,000 to Rossland Museum exterior projects, and about $1,200 in donations to the Miners Hall attic projector/screen, junior curling program, Nickle Plate gazebo maintenance, and for two trees to be planted at the skatepark.
Global community donations included $1,000 to Castlegar Rotary Club’s nutrition in the Peruvian Amazon, $750 to the H.E.L.P. Honduras program (for Tegucigalpa Market Children), and $742 to Rotary International’s polio eradication, Polio Plus.
Plans for the coming year include welcoming cyclists in early September who visit here as part of the WaCanId bicycle tour, hosting two Rotary youth exchange students January through March, and raising funds through the Rotary raffle (Instinct skis and more new prizes this year!) and the October Greater Trail Rotary online auction. We will plan fundraising events, sell ski coat racks, Panhandle for Polio (Golden City Days), organize the John Heintz Cup relay race for Winter Carnival, just to name a few things we plan to do.
Rossland Rotary Club is 19 members — adults of all ages, genders and backgrounds united in the vision that we can make a difference in the community and in the world. We believe our work is more effective and will have more impact by working as a team and through the structure offered by Rotary International.
We welcome those interested in the club to contact us and/or attend a meeting to visit and learn more about us, propose a project, make a presentation, or contribute to a particular project. The club is not affiliated with any religious or political organization (there is no secret handshake!), and we always appreciate the opportunity to get to know community-minded and service-oriented people who like the idea of giving back to one’s community.
See rosslandrotary.org for contacts, meeting dates, and more.