Grace Cottage Patients Benefit from Vermont Lions Donation
Several members of Vermont Lions Clubs from throughout Vermont and Vermont Lions Charities presented a check to Grace Cottage Hospital on Wednesday, January 17th in the amount of $13,250 to complete the hospital's effort to fund four new generators for Grace Cottage Hospital’s campus.
The donation was the result of an interesting sequence of events. Taylor Young at WCAX-TV (Channel 3, Burlington) had seen Grace Cottage’s Facebook post about the fundraising campaign for four generators, which would enable the hospital to continue operations during power outages. Taylor traveled to Townshend to do a story, which aired three times on WCAX on January 8th. Way up on the Vermont/Canadian border, Connie Laplume of the Troy & Area Lions Club saw the WCAX newscast, and e-mailed Vermont Lions Charities President Stan Patch, who also saw the story air on WCAX and put out a statewide plea. As a result, a $10,000 donation was made from Vermont Lions Charities, with the balance coming from the Troy & Area Lions Club, Valley Lions Club, and Londonderry Tri-Mountain Lions Club.
“This gift represents the effort of many, many Lions throughout the state of Vermont,” said Patch.“It didn’t seem acceptable to us that someone had to come in to start portable generators in the middle of the night every time the power goes out at a hospital,” added Laplume.
“It means so much to all of us here at Grace Cottage that Lions Clubs, whose motto is ‘We Serve,’ stepped up from all over the state to help us out with such a generous gift,” said Andrea Seaton, Grace Cottage’s Director of Development. “Thanks to the Lions Clubs, Vermont Lions Charities, and many other people from throughout the state, near and far, who have contributed, we met our Generator Fund goal of $115,798 within one month!”
