NEW?GLASGOW – Don Brown has a lot of pennies to count, and he’s grinning from ear to ear because of it.
Brown is a member of the Riverview Volunteer Association which held a penny campaign in October across Pictou County. The group was trying to raise funds to provide Riverview Home residents with much-needed recreational and social programs for the over 100 people with mental and physical challenges who currently reside in the facility.
The penny campaign went over far better than Brown ever imagined, raising more than $10,600, with more donations still trickling in.
“We still have some pennies to roll and count, and two churches called and said they have cheques for us as well,” Brown said. “The results have been wonderful.”
In fact, it’s far more than Brown and the other volunteers ever dreamed they’d be able to raise in a single weekend.
“We didn’t have any expectation – we’d never done this before, so we didn’t know how it would go,” he said. “We certainly didn’t expect this much. We thought if we got $600 or $700, it would be good.”
In one day, he said, the group brought 110,000 pennies to the bank – that’s $1,100.
Thankfully, many hands make light work – Brown called in some neighbours and friends, and more than 29 families volunteered to help roll the coins collected across Pictou, Antigonish and Guysborough counties.
Now that the money’s in place to offer more recreational activities to the residents of Riverview Home, volunteers are needed to help with the organization and implementation.
“We’re having a big drive for volunteers – we need people to push wheelchairs and help several people who are there in wheelchairs get out more than they are,” Brown added.
For more information on volunteering, call Meagan at 755-4884, extension 39.