Rotary Club of Hamilton AM members have always supported the RI Foundation but the "End Rotary Now" Campaign has really energized our members! We supported "Participate for Polio" Day in October and continue to support the "Every Member, Every Year" Campaign. Our gift to our meeting speakers for many years has been a certificate announcing a donation to RI to vaccinate 25 children against polio, in their name. The club recently received this citation from the RI Foundation.
Hamilton Arts & Letters writes "Our thanks to Rotary Club of Hamilton for Supporting the "Short Works Prize" and sponsoring "The Rotary Club of Hamilton AM Young Writers Awards"

Under Michelle Austin's leadership, club members from the Rotary Club of Hamilton AM donated enough funds or items to fill a special gift bag for students to take home for the holidays. The Annual Pancake Breakfast the club has hosted at the school for 20 years was cancelled this year due to the pandemic so members quickly switched to the gift bag alternative.
Along with significant cash donations, club members, sourced and donated mitts (Janet McNaught and Paul Lakin), juice boxes and fruit snacks (Mark Ewer), apples (Tom Tweedie) and toys (Dan Millar and the Salvation Army team). Special thanks to Darren Slemko from Tennier Sanitation whose donation supplied calculators for the Grade 7 and 8 students and Dr. Mark Shankman from Dundas Valley/Gore Park Dentistry for the tooth paste (to use after eating all the candy!).
Many thanks to Irene Stayshyn and Paul Reardon for purchasing many of the snack items and then organizing the packaging for each student. The pictures below show the packaging team who worked for 3 hours to produce the 220+ gift bags at Paul Reardon's home. Pictured below are Irene Stayshyn, Paul Reardon, Celine Legret, Don Grennan and Frank Stechey.
Finally, thanks to the delivery team that transported all 220+ bags to Hess Street School on December 17. This included Kerry Jarvi, Anne Bermingham, Irene Stayshyn and Paul Reardon.

BREAKING NEWS!
Rotary launched PolioPlus in 1985 and was a founding member of the Global Polio Eradication Initiative in 1988. Through decades of commitment and work by Rotary and our partners, more than 2.5 billion children have received the oral polio vaccine.