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Charitable Donation Made in the year ended June 2021

Mike Henderson,     Chair of Welfare Committee  reported:-

Once again we have given donations to a wide range of voluntary groups, charities and individuals in need.  On the international front we have made donations to LCIF and Belarus.  Both these come under the auspices of the Lions and the total for these amounts 10% of the total proposed by Welfare and just 6.5% of the total donations if we include the Hampers and the proceeds of the Prostate Walk.  Our main focus is on our local area where we have once again supported Heart of Kent Hospice, though less generously than in previous years and also Spadework.  We gave Spadework £1,000 to cover the cost of materials to construct a gourd tunnel.  This proved to be a very successful project and in October LP Peter and I attended the site for a conducted tour and a photo opportunity. More recently we have donated £500 to support the work they are doing to provide fresh vegetable boxes to local people in need during this current crisis.  LP Peter, Ray Lawrence and I also attended Heart of Kent Hospice where we met Georgina Parker, Chief Medical Clinician for palliative care.  She showed us how they are using their refurbished chapel and the new chairs we funded in June 2019 in a flexible way to accommodate a range of different activities.  Photos were taken of a formal handover of a cheque.  Unfortunately, we did not manage to get press coverage for this or for the Spadework pictures.  However, these were posted on our website and on Facebook.

The individuals who have benefitted have been veterans suffering from PTSD and a severely autistic child.  The student we agreed to support to participate in an international project will be refunding the money in August as his trip was cancelled.

On the medical front we have continued to extend the Message in a Bottle scheme.  We now have almost all medical surgeries covered in the Malling area as well as many chemists and other outlets.  Maidstone Lions have been very helpful by allowing us to purchase supplies from them as they buy a pallet at a time.

We continue to support young people and education. We agreed to support a second school for the ROAR scheme in 2020, but St James the Great declined and by then we were approaching lockdown and did not secure the agreement of a second school to take part. St George’s, Wrotham are keen participants and we are supporting them once again. We have pledged a small amount to Snodland Youth Club for equipment when they reopen.  The Family Trust and Maidstone Area Parent Support also come into this category.

Two other voluntary groups that deserved our support were Communigrow and Porchlight.

Since March our entire focus has been on doing what we can to help in the current Covid crisis with our limited funds.  In this context we have helped Spadework, Heart of Kent Hospice, Air Ambulance, SERV Kent and East Malling Food Bank all of whom are doing invaluable work in our local area. It was inevitable in this context that the Tea Party planned for April had to be cancelled.

Hampers and the Prostate Charity Walk do not come directly under Welfare but they clearly deserve a mention in this report.

In addition to monetary donations, the Club has given service to the community.

Several of the above come under the heading of providing a service to the local community, but often entail a significant cost to the Club (Hampers, Kingfisher Trips, Tea Party).  We should highlight the Message in a Bottle scheme which we have fully resurrected this year and we have outlets in most GP surgeries and many chemists in our area.  Using a supply of drawing materials we put together packs for distribution to local pre-schools. As a results we have distributed boxes of materials to Maidstone Hospital Children’s Ward, Young Carers, Crossroads and two pre-schools.  We have continued to collect and send off used spectacles from local opticians to Chichester Lions Club for recycling. Since August 2018 we have despatched 2672 pairs and has 400 ready to be sent off. He expects the final figure to be well over 3000 by July. In the next Lions Year we are looking into providing Diabetes Screening with the help of the President of Southborough Lions.

The photograph below shows the presentation of equipment to the Urology Department Specialist Team at Maidstone Hospital; Consultant, Mr Yamamoto said "Through the help of our local charities (LofF, Lions, PSCA Kent) we have setup a pioneering prostate biopsy clinic that helps patients avoids the risks of sepsis associated with biopsy whilst maintaining the accuracy of diagnosis."