Like many Rotary clubs in these isles, Colchester Rotary set up a Response and Recovery Fund to help struggling community organisations during the pandemic.
Raising donations from members and drawing on existing Rotary funds, the club has made substantial grants, both in money and kind, to: Anglian Community Enterprise, Citizens’ Advice Colchester, Colchester Foodbank, the Colchester Institute, the Creffield Medical Centre, the ESNEFT Wellbeing Fund, Headway Essex, ShelterBox and Next Chapter, a Colchester-based charity working with victims of domestic violence.
Joanna Wright, Chief Executive of Headway Essex, thanked Colchester Rotary for the funding.
She said: “Our staff and services are needed more than ever during the ongoing crisis, and the reality of the situation is we would not be able to continue without the support of generous people like you.”
And Eleanor Burgoyne from Next Chapter added: “The support we are receiving from people and organisations in our area during this Covid-19 epidemic is truly heart-warming”.
The Colchester Institute will use the Rotary club’s gift to produce some 500 protective visors for use in health and social care settings.
Colchester Institute will use the Rotary club’s gift to produce some 500 protective visors for use in health and social care settings.
Their gift for the Creffield Medical Centre provided a pizza lunch and goody bags containing hand cream, face cream and water bottles for their hard-working staff.
Having to cancel planned fund-raising events this summer has not deterred members of Lutterworth Rotary in Leicestershire from thinking of imaginative ways of raising money for local charities.
Members have contributed their ‘dinner money’ over the last two months to help fund the local Food bank donating over £500.
Additionally, Rotarians have been challenged to “Step up for Rotary” by setting a daily step target, keeping fit and receiving sponsorship for local charities who would normally benefit from cancelled events. Early indications are that they have raised another £500.
Although most of Buckingham Rotary Club’s activities have been either postponed or cancelled during the COVID-19 pandemic, they have been working with the emergency foodbank hosted at the Buckingham Athletic Community Football Club.
Buckingham Rotary manages a delivery team of 36 drivers who have delivered 132 food parcels, including some to families of Buckingham Young Carers.
In Staffordshire, Stone & District Rotary has been able to obtain a grant from Rotary’s own charity, The Rotary Foundation.
This is part of a $3 million worldwide disaster response grant from The Rotary Foundation to provide personal protective equipment and food for vulnerable people in response to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Together with Lee Walker Butchers, they have provided some fresh meat in the food bank parcels being prepared and distributed by Stone Community Hub, utilising the grant funding.
In Derbyshire, a COVID-19 activity with a difference, Church Wilne Rotary were giving out bicycle bells as part of a Rotary promotion.
In North Wales, Llandudno Rotary are one of hundreds of Rotary clubs working closely with their local foodbanks.
They are actively working with two local food banks; ‘Hope Restored’ at the old Baptist Church in West Shore, and Ty Hapus, which operates out of the old Ysgol John Bright Sports Hall in Cwm Road.
The Rotary club has donated food plus £600 cash to date. They have agreed to donate a further £300 for June, with four Rotarians active in collecting and co-ordinating this help.
In Essex and North London, Loughton, Buckhurst Hill and Chigwell Rotarians continue their amazing community work as part of a co-ordinated community campaign with a number of organisations.
Last week, they took delivery of 100,000 McDonald’s burgers and buns, 300 meals from Food4All, drinks from Paul Schafer and Coca-Cola and distributed these to some amazing charities across the region.
Loughton, Buckhurst Hill and Chigwell Rotarians continue their amazing community work as part of a co-ordinated community campaign with a number of organisations.
In Northern Ireland, Rotarians in Newbridge showed their support to frontline workers by hoisting flags in the town centre. They were joined at the ceremony by Garda Brian Carroll and Shane Smyth.
In Kent, Medway Sunlight Rotary is helping to provide food bags for frontline NHS staff after a gruelling shift dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic. Over the last four weeks, they have delivered 200 bags of food to hospital staff, which have been gratefully received.
New Forest Rotary in Hampshire has donated £500 to the Minstead Trust. The charity supports vulnerable people in society.
In Shropshire, Ironbridge Rotary are part sponsor of a freezer van used by the Foodshare Project, Woodside, Telford, which is supporting the local community.
Mendip Rotary in Somerset has been active supporting the local community during the coronavirus lockdown and remains ready to support needy communities worldwide.
When Rotarians from Kerala, Southern India, contacted the Mendip club in January seeking help, Mendip responded quickly and positively.
The Indian club, in partnership with other local clubs, had identified a chronic shortage of dialysis machines and beds to treat the many suffering from renal failure, an all too common medical issue in India.
Government dialysis facilities are heavily oversubscribed and those in private hospitals unaffordable by the poor in Indian society.
Taking action, Rotary clubs in India subscribed $64,000 towards the cost 15 dialysis machines with associated equipment and training. The total project cost required however was $13,0000.
Mendip Rotary in Somerset has been active supporting the local community during the coronavirus lockdown and remains ready to support needy communities worldwide.”
Mendip agreed to be the international partner for the project and added $1,250 to the funds.
Significantly, Mendip Rotary’s support enabled an application to Rotary’s own charity, The Rotary Foundation, seeking the balance.
Mendip has received notification that the application had been successful in full and the whole project is now proceeding.
The project will enable 2,500 of the poorest in Indian society to access free dialysis treatment as needed.
Rotary in this area has a history of engagement with Rotarians from Kerala. Reciprocal visits have taken place and support has been given to India for eye care, flood relief, clean water and now dialysis.
Indian Rotarians have reciprocated by financially supporting the provision of cancer care facilities at the Dorchester Hospital and have joined with Mendip Rotary to finance a comprehensive medical, educational, and economic development project in Uganda.
That project, now in its second successful year, is bringing education, clean water, and medical care to a village in rural Uganda.
Anne Wall, President of Northallerton Mowbray Rotary in North Yorkshire, wrote this poem to reflect the current COVID-19 crisis:
Lockdown Poem
What is this world if full of Covid bugs
That keep us from our friendly hugs?
Shops shut. Pubs closed
And every day the question posed
“How long must this go on?
Clapping for NHS heroes on a Thursday night
As we hear of their daily fight
To free the world of this disease
And listen to their tearful pleas.
Children now learning from home
Ramblers wanting to continue to roam
While Captain, now Colonel Tom
Performs his daily garden prom.
Virtual meetings held by Zoom
Connecting family, friends, colleagues in their room
Daily bulletins on the TV
Giving us stats and instructions to keep us free.
Discovering pleasures once cast aside
Due to busy lives that made us slide
Away from reading, cooking and crafting
And concentrate on daily grafting.
Suddenly the thoughts of community hold our sway
As we discover what we can do every day
To help our neighbours in distress or need
And gain satisfaction in performing a simple deed.
Kindness and caring will win the day
Over this infection that holds us in its way
So we can look at how we cope
And learn again to live in hope.
Anne Wall. May 2020
