Why should we support The Rotary Foundation?
As Foundation month draws to an end, I thought it appropriate to address the question of why we should support The Rotary Foundation, which I am often asked.
Donating money to the charity of your choice is a very personal issue and no-one can prescribe to another what they should do with their hard-earned cash. The Rotary Foundation (TRF) is the charitable arm of Rotary International and as such, as a Rotarian, TRF is your charity.
This alone is not a compelling reason, but what I find hard to dismiss is their track record: TRF is one of the only charities in the world where not one cent of the donations received is spent on Administration – yes, 100 cents in the $1 is donated into projects and communities around the world. PolioPlus, our flagship project has reduced the rate of Polio to where it is now found in less than 1% of the world – we are so close to eradicating it! And probably most importantly, the foundation is governed by Rotarians, people like you and me, people we like to associate with – they take care of our donations and ensure that they end up in the right places.
We have been very fortunate in the Cayman Islands that we have been net givers to TRF and to date, have made very little use of the funds available to us, with benefits in our District going to primarily to our brothers and sisters in Haiti and Jamaica. This will change over the next few years as it is envisaged that the Rotary Clubs of the Cayman Islands will join together to apply for joint Matching Grants to support the new initiative spearheaded by our own Bruce John, The Caring for Life Foundation that will underpin the capital needs of our health services. So any dollar given to the Foundation will start flowing back in our direction and our health will depends on this.
No donation is too small or too big – our future is in your hands!