Rotary Club hosts project fair

Rotarians from North and Central America are currently in Belize to attend their annual project fair, which opens tonight at the Princess Hotel. Belize City Rotary Club President, Kay Menzies, says the event aims to identify local projects for funding by the visiting clubs.

Kay Menzies, Belize City Rotary Club

“The Belize City Club is putting up about twelve projects. One is a pre-school project to help various pre-schools in different areas of the City. Basically the idea is that North American Rotarians come down to see how they can help the country that they’re visiting. There are other countries from Central America here, but Belize has the focus because Belize is the host country.”

Meanwhile, the visiting Rotarians were engaged in an educational workshop about Rotary International. For Zen Moisey, the most satisfying part of what he does is the fund-raising for worthy projects.

Zen Moisey, Rotary Club Member, Canada

“We get matching grants from our province. Alberta, for example, will give us a dollar for every dollar we raise and Rotary International will give us fifty cents on that, so we have three and a half dollars. Then we go to our Canadian government and we get about a dollar and a half, so the dollar we raise doing a bingo or whatever suddenly becomes four or five dollars. And then the clubs here in Central America will also put in some money, so something significant can be done.”

“Essentially the local clubs here put up about twenty, twenty-five percent of the money and the rest of the money comes in from the outside, or it could be materials, it could be a container of clothing, it could be various things.”

The four Rotary Clubs of Belize are seeking funding for close to twenty projects, including child care, parks and traffic education.