On Saturday, April 25, 2015 at 11:45 am Nepal was severely struck by a major earthquake. The magnitude of this earthquake hit a 7.9 on the Richter scale followed by several aftershock tremors. On Sunday, April 26, 2015, Nepal suffered another major earthquake, this one with a magnitude of 6.7 and followed yet again by several aftershock tremors. The devastation was widespread- nearly 6,000 men, women, and children were dead and over 11,000 more suffered injuries.
Just three days after the final earthquake, a call to action was made by Rotary District 6600’s District Governor, Rex Engle. He reached out to each of the 63 Rotary Clubs in our district and encouraged everyone to dig deep as clubs and as individuals to help lend support to Nepal. The initiative was focused on sending ShelterBoxes to as many families in Nepal as possible. As an added incentive, District Governor Rex Engle pledged that the District would match 20% of the cost to the first 20 boxes collected.
Donations began to come in from both clubs and individuals at a great pace but then something truly incredible happened. Mark Makulinski from the Toledo Rotary Club, offered to personally match $50,000 for all funds raised for the Nepal ShelterBox initiative. With this new incentive, District Governor Rex Engle challenged clubs to Light Up Rotary and reach the full potential of this generous match.
The response from the District was incredible! Just check out the numbers:
- 42 clubs participated in fundraising
- One generous $50,000 donation from Toledo Rotarian Mark Makulinski
- $59,575 collected from clubs and individuals, including top fundraising clubs Toledo and Fremont
- $4,000 District 6600 contributions
Resulting in:
- A $113,572 ShelterBox contribution from District 6600 and
- Over 100 Shelter Boxes provided to families in Nepal
This Nepal ShelterBox campaign was just one way that District 6600 Rotarians changed lives under the leadership of Governor Rex Engle this Rotary year.
If you haven’t already, just visit rotarydistrict6600.org and check out the circle counters to see the results of our Annual Fund and Polio Plus giving. Your contributions and service are truly how Rotary helps to change lives all over the world.
Learn more about ShelterBox at shelterbox.org
