Page 61 - Phonebox Magazine May 2013

What a lot of chocoholics live in our area if the result of our 2013 Easter egg raffle is to be believed. On the other hand, it’s probably more of an indication of how generous our local community is despite being in the grips of recession and austerity.
Our not so young spring chicken members laid 16 big Easter eggs in a number of outlets in and around our area and thanks to the customers of the various pubs, hairdressers, cafes and restaurants, we are amazed to find that we have had our best year since 2005 with over £1793 having been raised. Fifty per cent of the profits from each laying goes to the outlets’ favourite good cause (in some cases we were happy to see the entire sum going to a particular cause) with the remainder coming back into the Lions coffers for distribution within our own community programmes. The main beneficiaries this year were the Connie Allen Footsteps fund, McMillan Cancer Care, Willen Hospice, Northants Air Ambulance, Age UK, North Crawley Primary School and Jensons Fund – visit our website for links to each and for more details of what the all do. To everyone who bought a ticket but didn’t win, we say a great big thanks and to our winners (especially some who we know donated the egg to other good causes), congratulations and thanks for supporting the event.
Lions Ramp up Blindness Fight
Count to 60 – that’s how much time a child somewhere in the world has left before going blind. According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), a child goes blind every minute and what is even sadder is that about 40% of childhood blindness can be prevented or treated.
Lions are not sitting by idly, of course. Lions Clubs International (LCIF) signed an agreement with WHO in 2011 to aid global efforts to fight preventable blindness and focus on emerging threats to vision health via our Sightfirst Programme. Lions clubs worldwide have played a key role in helping to reduce global blindness since its inception of Sightfirst in 1990 and over 121 million children have received treatment in our child- friendly Lions eye care centres worldwide.
LCIF is investing an additional $3m to help develop 26 new child friendly eye care centres in developing countries and is also working with WHO to prevent and control Diabetic eye disease via a $400,000 grant to support the training of health care workers in developing countries to better detect and treat this condition. Locally we recently paid for a screening programme in India and we are currently awaiting the details of the results achieved. Keep an eye on a future Phonebox to find out how it went.
Events in Newport Pagnell
Originally formed by residents of Newport Pagnell AND Olney our club membership was roughly equally split between both towns. Time and tide has been harsher on the Newport members in recent years leaving Olney members very much in the majority. As a result, much of the activity in past years has centred around Olney, however that is likely to change as the club goes from strength to strength and intends to become a lot more visible and active in the home of Aston Martin and the Iron Bridge. Hopefully this will redress the balance and take us back to a near 50:50 split.
We have had meetings with a number of community groups in the town and out of these we were invited to help out at the annual Carnival taking place on Saturday 6th July.
The Lions, supported by our Friends group, will be manning the entrance gates and helping take some pressure off the Carnival Committee who are at full stretch organising this extremely popular event.
Our efforts are not just about helping
other groups either, as we will be running three, yes three fairs in the town between now and Christmas. Dates for your Diary are:
20th July – Gifts Goodies & Crafts 12th October – An Autumnal Food and Drink Fair
14th December – A last minute Christmas Fair
All at the United Reformed Church hall.
Entry will be free so this is a good opportunity to pop into town and see what’s on offer.
Can you help us?
If you feel that you could give us some support by becoming one of our friends group then please get in touch. Speak to any of the folks in Lions tops on Carnival day or at one of our Lions fairs and we can explain what it is all about. If you are on the web, visit our website at www.nplions. btck.co.uk and get in touch via our contact page.
We’d love you to be part of our revival in Newport Pagnell.
And Finally
You don’t need to spend a penny to support the club and help us raise funds. If you use a computer printer and don’t currently recycle your old cartridges, why not do so for us. Freepost envelopes can be obtained from Barclays and Nat West Banks, LA Car Wash (Yardley Hastings), Sandwichland and Rosco’s Coffee shop. Pick some up and join our recycling brigade – every penny helps.
Costa Coffee in Olney Market Place are the latest outlet for our envelopes. Visit their community board to pick up an envelope when you next drop in for a coffee.
Phonebox Magazine 61
THE LIONS DEN