OUR ROTARY MEMBERS COULD NOT HAVE DONE IT ALONE!
Hemel Rotary Club would like to thank everyone who helped with the Santa Sleigh activity, the Santa Raffle and indeed everyone who donated along the way.
We would also like to thank all the local businesses who sponsored the routes and contributed around £2000 to the fund as well as all the pubs and clubs who helped us by raffling chocolate Santa’s in aid of charity.
Once again, we are extremely grateful to our collector organisations who helped on the street by street routes, and our Friends of Rotary who assisted with the Static collections.
Each of the 25 organisations, which helped Santa and Mrs. Claus will receive £320 at a presentation evening at the end of February, and the remainder will be donated by Hemel Rotary to local charities and organisations at a second presentation evening.
The Hemel Rotary Santa Sleigh was out last November and December in Hemel Hempstead, Kings Langley and Abbots Langley, bringing joy, seasonal songs and lots of fun to children of all ages.
Despite the efforts of Storms Bert and Darragh, and four routes needing to be rearranged, we still managed to complete all 25 street by street routes, supported by 25 collector organisations, visiting 386 roads and covering 111 kilometres (69 miles).
There were seven static events with the chance to have photos taken with the Sleigh helped by 50 volunteers who gave 250 man hours as collectors, drivers and Mr or Mrs Claus.
The months activity raised £15,000. Cash in buckets made up £11,150 of this, resulting in the counting of 564 notes and 22,099 sterling coins. Since the introduction of the Hemel Rotary Santa Sleigh over £110,000 has been raised and donated back into the community.
We intend to do the same next Christmas and would welcome anyone who would like to join in with this and our other fundraising and community service activities
We are always looking for helpers during our very active Christmas season. Especially with our static collections.
So if you feel you could assist by doing a shift at a static collection, being a Santa or Mrs Claus or if you have a tow bar on your car and fancy towing the sleigh. Please contact us.