What’s happening at South Wairarapa Rotary Club

The new Rotary year has just started, and committees are already busy on finding ways to put funds raised from the Rotary Martinborough Fair back into the South Wairarapa community. Well, it’s not all fund-raising and meetings at South Wairarapa Rotary; we also get together and help out on fun projects such as pest control at Greytown’s Tait’s Reserve (apparently, birds are starting to return to the reserve, so the trapping is obviously effective!), and planting native flaxes at the Whangaimoana sand dunes. 

On August 3rd, some of our members went on the yearly visit to the dunes to help Past President Alastair Sutherland (who was coordinating this annual restoration project), local residents and Greater Wellington Regional Council.  1,500 flaxes were planted, which was an outstanding effort, and a fair few sausages consumed at the barbeque held after the work was done.

Work is also under way on planning next year’s Rotary Martinborough Fair, as Convenor Griff Page, warms up to his new role.  Past joint Convenors, Paul and Mary Mason, did a fabulous job running the fair for the last 3 years, and we look forward to Griff continuing their good work. 

Funds raised each year from the Rotary Martinborough Fair are put back into the South Wairarapa community in the form of grants and bursaries to provide financial help local groups and individuals trying to reach their goals. 

The club will also be helping organise the Food Bank Appeal and Greytown Christmas Parade again this year, as well as managing the annual bursaries for Kuranui and Taratahi. Each year, South Wairarapa Rotary awards two bursaries worth $4,500 each to students at Kuranui who require a little financial help to enable them to continue their studies at tertiary level. Also a bursary worth $3,515 to a student at Taratahi to help him/her with their studies at that facility. 

Our weekly club meetings are also a lot of fun, where we enjoy each others’ company over a meal, and then we always have an interesting speaker to round off the evening. 

So, it’s all happening at South Wairarapa Rotary. To find out more about what we do for the community, or how to seek financial help for a project or venture that you’re planning which will benefit our community, visit our website www.swrotary.org.nz. 

To find out more about the Rotary Martinborough Fair, visit www.martinboroughfair.org.nz. And you can also listen into “Rotary Matters”, a programme all about Rotary in Wairarapa, broadcast on Arrow 92.7FM on the first Friday of each month at 2:30pm (next programme will broadcast Friday September 6th).