Christmas Family Appeals
The Club is pleased to support families at Christmas with donations for:
- the Annual Christmas Appeals for the Salvation Army, St Vincent de Paul and (since2004) the Belfast Homeless Services
- Rotary Christmas Toy Boxes
The Belfast Rotary Club has been pleased to promote and support, from its inception, the Christmas Family Appeal which collected and distributed Christmas toys and gifts for families in need across Northern Ireland who, for whatever reason, would not otherwise get a present at Christmas. Historically the Appeal grew rapidly, as did the need to help and it became a joint venture between The Salvation Army and the Society of St Vincent de Paul, supported by BBC Northern Ireland. The Club continued its involvement with Club members bringing in gifts on the first meeting in December and teams from the Club, with volunteers from the Salvation Army and St Vincent de Paul, would sort and wrap the donated presents. It was a very humbling experience to see the public's generosity with all the fabulous new toys, books and games and gift vouchers left in to collection centres. The Rotary Club of Belfast no longer took the lead, this is quite a usual feature of Rotary projects -a need is identified, a scheme developed to fill that need and set it in motion and when the Club is satisfied that the need is being fulfilled it is happy for others to take it on, thus leaving the Club free to put its efforts where others' needs have been identified. However in 2014 the BBC withdrew its support so our help for the Salvation Army was even more needed and appreciated The Club continued its support of this appeal through the donation of, as then requested, vouchers which left a lot more flexibility in assembling the parcels, also with packing the parcels and whatever the Salvation Army or St Vincent de Paul requested. Latterly however it was decided that a donation of £500 each would more useful as they can purchase what presents or vouchers they need.
The Rotary KidsOut Christmas Toy Box is an initiative which provides children who have fled domestic violence and are living in refuge with a brand new box of toys filled with kindly donated toys. The Club is just one of many Rotary Clubs across the UK participating in a nationwide campaign to provide a Rotary Christmas Toy Box. All the toy boxes are packed by KidsOut with brand new toys and distributed on behalf of the Club straight to refuges for the mothers to give to their children from Santa in time for Christmas.
The Club has donated 10 such boxes since 2000.