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Over 1,000 people gave up their Saturday morning on September 17, 2005 to help 40 charitable organizations in Santa Barbara County. The 85 volunteer teams, families, and individuals completed 70 projects. In just 4 hours, much needed projects like painting fences, gardening at school sites, and sorting contributed food were completed.
The morning began with a pep rally to kickoff United Way of Santa Barbara County's Community Campaign at Page Youth Center. The breakfast entertainment included the Dos Pueblos High School Marching Band, the Santa Barbara City College Cheer Squad, and Dancing Drum . The program was led by Gary and Catherine from KLITE-101.7, who introduced John Romo, United Way's 2005-2006 Community Campaign Chair and President of Santa Barbara City College. With a drum roll from the marching band and Dancing Drum, Mr. Romo announced the campaign goals for the year: $3,002,000 in total pledges, an average gift of $273, and $2,251,500 in unrestricted gifts. Jim Armstrong, Deputy Campaign Chair and City Administrator of the City of Santa Barbara, let everyone know the totals from Pacesetter Campaigns that run in July and August, which topped out at almost $840,000!
After an exciting breakfast, sponsored in part by Catering by Lori Cordova, volunteer teams, which included coworkers, families, and friends, went out into our community to do their "hands-on" assignments. The largest team was Westmont College with 93 volunteers! Raytheon Company and Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter Day Saints were the second largest with 75 volunteers each. Third largest were employees of the City of Santa Barbara . These and other teams helped different local charities in Carpinteria, Santa Barbara, Goleta, and Santa Ynez complete many needed projects.
Isla
Vista Youth Projects: Gardening playground areas and cleaning children's
toys Santa Barbara School Districts Healthy Start: Making Home
Play Learning Kits The Salvation Army: Organizing the kitchen storage and painting a classroom Transition House: Building a children's play structure and making decorations for the Casablanca Ball
A special “thank you” goes out to our sponsors who helped make this event possible!
Kickoff
Sponsor Santa Barbara News-Press
Cornerstone
Sponsors Wells Fargo Bank Wolfe & Associates Page Youth Center
($1,000-1,999) Pacific Coast Business Times Catering by Lori Cordova Cottage Health System Home Improvement Center Pacific Scientific QAD Raytheon Company Santa Barbara Bank & Trust The Santa Barbara Independent
Building
Block Sponsors Brown & Brown of California, Inc. Community West Bank Damitz, Brooks, Nightingale, Turner & Morrisset Goleta Coffee Company La Arcada Investment Corporation Lockheed Martin Santa Barbara Focalplane
Platinum Insurance Marketing Starbuck Tisdale & Associates Easy LiftSpectrum Health Clubs Classic Party Rentals Investec Management Corp. Santa Barbara Rehabilitation Institute Magellan's Travel Supplies NG Sound Graphic Traffic Seed Mackall LLP Congresswoman Lois Capps Wexford Corporation Debbie's Delights Gary & Catherine of K-LITE
The United States is weathering the worst hurricane season in memory. Tens of thousands have been displaced and there have been hundreds of millions of dollars in damage to lives and property along the Gulf Coast. The United Way system will continue to serve the affected communities that are grappling not only with the effects of this season's devastating hurricanes, but also with the existing community needs that these natural disasters only exacerbate. After the storm passes and the rains stop and flooding ends, United Way will be mobilizing communities, working with public and private agencies, service providers, faith-based organizations, schools, elected officials, and government representatives at local, state, and federal levels and other community organizations to speed the services needed for recovery.
Every dollar contributed to United Way's Hurricane Response and Recovery Fund will be used to fund services that address both short- and long-term needs of the individuals and families affected by hurricane destruction. Most people, fortunately, are making gifts both nationally and locally - one gift to help survivors of the hurricane, and one gift to help local Santa Barbara County men, women & children in need - those dealing with homelessness and hunger. Your gift also helps strengthen families and provides our local seniors independence, and helps in so many other ways. Many local organizations are providing relief to hurricane survivors of Katrina/Rita along with local needs as well, including Cox Communications. Cox Enterprises, Inc. announced a $10 million gift of cash and in-kind donations to the victims of Hurricane Katrina, which includes gifts of $750,000 in cash and more than $1 million of in-kind services to the United Ways of the impacted areas. The gift provides support to those impacted by the hurricane, including more than 2,000 Cox employees, and the funds will help rebuild the lives of those who have experienced loss due to the disaster. This help is in addition to their generous local support in Santa Barbara County, where Cox Communications and its employees are one of the County's top ten most generous contributors to United Way. In addition, United Way is receiving assistance from Hollywood. Actor/Producer/Director George Clooney is a member of United Way of America's Board of Trustees. Along with his time and energy, George Clooney has made a $1 million donation to United Way's Hurricane Katrina Response Fund. This gift is also in addition to his generous annual gift to his local United Way organization. If you would like to make a donation to the hurricane relief efforts and also help insure that local services will be available for people in need next year, please go to www.unitedwaysb.org and click on Donate Securely, or call 805-965-8591 and ask for Jennifer or Simon.
Nordstrom officially kicked off its 2005 campaign with a hugely successful and energetic rally for 250 employees on Saturday, September 24. Store manager Valerie Korac introduced a dance team headed by a Nordstrom employee to start the morning in style. Guest speaker Kaleigh Williams, Fun in the Sun counselor for the Ortega Park site, told stories about her Fun in the Sun counselor experience and taught the group the “banana dance," a favorite with the kids at Fun in the Sun.
“We are really thrilled about exceeding our goal,” remarked HR Manager Lisa McKinley , “It was a huge success—everyone had fun and loved the banana song!” Due to the overwhelming employee response, Lisa turned the October 1 carnival event into a “thank you event”. Always a trooper, Valerie still had to get in the dunk tank!
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