May Fair Charities

Wivenhoe May Fair usually supports 10 charities by fundraising during the event and allocating proceeds from the event. Since 2000 nearly £35,000 has been raised. If you would like more information about the charities, how to nominate a charity or to get involved please send us an email to charities@wivenhoemayfair.com.

The 2012 May Fair will be raising money for:

Friends of Russ Foundation
Re-cycle
East Anglian Childrens Hospice
Colchester and Tendring Womens Refuge
Colchester Night Shelter
Colchester CAB
Wivenhoe Helping Hands
Transition Town Wivenhoe
Wildlives
Open Road - SOS bus project

Please give generously on the day as it makes a big difference to these local charities.

UPDATE FROM 2011:
£4,500 was raised for charity in 2011 thanks to the support of over one hundred volunteers who help run the Wivenhoe May Fair.

As a result of bucket rattling by the May Fairies and volunteer stewards, the following ten charities will each receive a donation:

* EACHSA
* Re-Cycle
* The Russ Foundation
* East Anglian Children's Hospice
* Colchester Citizens Advice Bureau
* Colchester Womens' Refuge
* Colchester Night Shelter
* Transition Wivenhoe
* Wivenhoe Helping Hands
* Wivenhoe Ferry Trust

Here's what the charities had to say about it:

---

Wivenhoe Helping Hands

Wivenhoe Helping Hands seems to be meeting a definite need within the community, with about 30 tasks completed each month, mainly involving taking people to doctor, hospital, hair appointments and the like, but also things like helping people with domestic chores when they have a temporary problem, shopping and so on.

We used the majority of your donation to get insurance cover for our volunteers and the organisation, as we felt that, in today's world of no win, no fee litigation, we should protect ourselves. That cost us £366 but gives us peace of mind. Other outgoings run at about £100 per month, for the phone, stationery and the like. However, we have been fortunate enough to receive other donations from community events such as Wivenhoe Open Gardens, and we also usually receive donations from those we assist, so we are in reasonably robust financial health.

We continue our programme of outreach to try to ensure that anybody in need of help in Wivenhoe knows they can turn to us, and plan another leaflet drop and some new, more eye-catching notices in such places as the Co-op notice board. We will also be placing messages in the press (in the broadest sense) asking for more volunteers. Although we still have more than 40, we are a trifle limited when it comes to drivers who can take people to appointments during the week, as many of our volunteers also have jobs to attend to.

All in all, WHH seems to be thriving, not only helping those who need assistance, but also the volunteers, in making them feel more part of the community.

---

EACH (East Anglia's Children's Hospices)

The past year at East Anglia's Children's Hospices has been very exciting. Firstly, after our very successful Treehouse Appeal which was launched in 2010, we achieved our £3million so our new Treehouse Hospice was built in Ipswich and opened to families in May 2011. We have had incredible feedback from everyone which is something we are very proud of.

We now continue to fundraise to be able to provide the care to the children and families in the area. Your donation helps us to do this and for that we are truly grateful.

We need to raise around £4.8 million from public donations to deliver our services this year from our three hospices. This amounts to more than £13,000 a day, every day of the year.

We support families and care for children and young people with life-threatening conditions across Cambridgeshire, Essex, Norfolk and Suffolk. We deliver a range of services that includes: short break care, specialist play activities, music therapy, hydrotherapy, parent and sibling groups, care at end of life and bereavement support for all family members. We provide care and support wherever the family wishes, in the families' own home, in the community or at one of our hospices in Ipswich, Milton or Quidenham. We continue to develop the quality and range of our services to support children and their families. The number of families we help has increased by 48% in the past two years, and last year we helped 547 families.

The Treehouse Hospice cares for children in Suffolk and Essex and there is an increasing amount of support in Essex so a new North Essex Fundraising team was brought in in 2011. I am part of this team. We launched some new events in the local area which includes our 'Family Fun and Dog Day' which was held at Layer Marney in September 2011. This event was fantastic and we raised over £3000. We are planning on making this years event even bigger and better and it will be held on Sunday 30th September at Layer Marney from 12pm - 5pm.

We also held our Braintree Santa Run in December. Over 40 people ran 2km around Braintree to raise money for EACH. It was a brilliant morning with such a lovely atmosphere and a great way to start the Christmas Festivities.

We have seen an increasing amount of support since we have been here and it is fantastic to meet all our supporters and help raise money for EACH.

We have had an excellent start to 2012. HRH The Duchess of Cambridge has become a Royal Patron of EACH. The Duchess's support will help us increase the awareness and understanding of the full range of services we offer children and families, and celebrates the great work being done by all children's hospices across the UK.

Thank you so much for your support.

---

Russ Foundation

Russ Foundation, in India, spent the May Fair donation this year as part of its Care and Support programme for PLHA (People Living with HIV and AIDS). This project had been funded by Bill and Melinda Gates, but was time-bound and when their money stopped coming in we, the board of trustees in England, really wanted to continue to provide the service. (The Gates auditors had declared Russ Foundation to be the top charity in South India for getting best value for their money.) The programme gives respite and care to those associated with, not just suffering from, HIV. This includes being able to support, at their thriving children's home, children orphaned by deaths from AIDS.

Three new AIDS orphans have been taken in at the home since the May Fair. Two are old enough to go to the campus school and the three year old is looked after during the day by the staff. All are thriving, despite tragic stories.

Vijaypandi is a four year old, at Russ since the summer. His mother, a female sex worker in the city was part of Russ' programme to encourage these women to stay healthy, checked for HIV, and as safe as possible in their jobs. Despite these efforts she was knifed by 'clients' after a dispute about money. Russ Foundation became aware of her hospitalisation because there was a Russ number on her mobile phone. She died in the morning and her son was going to be taken into care. Russ intervened and brought him to the children's home. Nurses also prepared his mother's body for cremation (there is still a stigma around touching dead AIDS victims). He is a happy, lively, school-going child now who, on the surface at least, has recovered from his mother's death.

I am not sure if it was the precise rupees which your money to us after the May Fair 'bought' that brought Vijay to and keeps him at Russ Foundation, where he is part of a 30 children strong 'family', but it may very well have been. In any case, this is the work that Russ undertakes and that we gave our May Fair money to. We, Good Foundation - Friends of Russ or Russ Foundation International as we have recently re-named our registered UK charity, are currently Russ' only financial supporters. Anything we get goes straight to the support of the children and their projects. We have no overheads at all and all our board members are volunteers.

Thanks very much in anticipation of the May Fair Committee's continued support; the specific project will always be Russ Foundation, especially projects connected with the Children's Home described above.

---

Transition Wivenhoe

We have used your kind donation to add to our pot that helps fund a number of schemes:

We bought an apple press that we have used to juice local fruit. This will be avilable to the community in 2012 to borrow, and we will be organising 'Apple Days' where the community can get involved in juicing their own apples.

We also used the funds to help fund an energy advice scheme where we give advice to residents and provide free loan of electricuty monitors to help them fnd out how much energy they are using, and how much it costs.

The money helped as initial funds to put on a Barn Dance in September that showcased local talent and food / drink. We ended up making a small profit from the event, but could not have done it without the initial capital boost from the May Fair.

---

EACHSA

The Mayfair donation has helped us to make terrific progress this year. Firstly it helped us to reach our target of donations of £5,000.00 in order to qualify to become a Registered Charity. Now we feel very respectable!

We have continued to send out boxes of books both from here, and our first 'remote ' collection from a super lady in Stockton- on- Tees. Sandra collected the books and packed them ready for our shippers to collect and ship them ( and all at no extra cost to us). So we are hoping to get more volunteers around the counrty to do this.

Deliveries have gone to the Universities of Pretoria and the Witwatersrand for distribution to their outreach programmes. Getting photos back can somtimes be a bit problematical but there are some on the website.www.eachsa.org.uk.

Donations of books teddies, pencils etc have come from various local schools,churches and individuals.

The local knitting group in Wivenhoe are knitting blanket squares for an orphanage for Children with HIV Aids. When we saw the photos of their dormitories they are looked so grey and miserable we thought we could jolly them up a bit ( as well as making good packing for the heavy books). If anyone would like to knit a few I am told the square is 35 stitches of double knit! Jackie Riley would be pleased to receive them, as would I at 78 Rectory Road.

Your donation also helped us to have our first leaflets printed.

Please thank everyone for their support and good wishes.

---