JIMMY Lee is the new man at the helm after he was inducted as president of the Rotary Club of Durban recently.
In his outgoing address, Mike Hiron, who has been president for the past two years, said the highlight of his tenure was the club’s 90th Charter Dinner fundraiser in January last year which had over 100 Rotarians and friends enjoy an evening with Tony Leon as guest speaker.
“We have recognised three Paul Harris Awards of which two you have witnessed tonight, five very deserving citizens of the Glenwood area were awarded with Community Service Awards for outstanding community work and we have bestowed honorary membership to two great Rotarians who left active service,” he said.
During Mike’s time as president, the Club has helped enrich the lives of children in our community by providing funding to HOLAH and also put up a Christmas Tree at Davenport last December to raise funds for The Durban Child and Youth Care Centre. The project raised more than expected and on top of the much-needed money there were also donations of three water tanks, one of which is already providing much-needed water to their vegetable garden through the dryer periods. For other fundraising the club held an indoor soccer tournament at Stella as well as four quiz evenings.
“We supplied four wheelchairs to deserving disabled people and have agreed to obtain another five more. We also did a feeding scheme test with Magau at the Home of Kids in Cato Ridge as well as donating a 4000l Jojo Tank to The Horizon Farm Trust Water Project in the Goba Gorge. The Jersey Project which started back in 2002 is still going strong and we have had knitted and donated over 600 jerseys to children in need over the last two years,” he said.
In his acceptance speech, Jimmy Lee said he was humbled to be elected.
“I accept this role to be your leader and will be fully committed to serving the ideals of Rotary and will try and support each and every member of the club. Our Rotary theme this year is Rotary serving Humanity, a meaningful theme relevant to our service work to our community,” he said.
He said some of the goals he hoped to achieve this coming year including making the activities and accomplishments of the club known to the community and to engage the community to join in and help, to tap into Rotary International matching grants for bigger projects in the community, to find more suitable projects in the community as the club has funds available for well motivated projects.
“I also aim to support the Rotary family by engaging with the Glenwood High and Eden College Interact Clubs, as this is the future of Rotary, and to support old age homes in the area as many are struggling to survive due to lack of support,” he said.
