Dear Sister Soroptimists of Northern England .The floods here in Cumbria have long gone and you will all have seen or heard about the devastation left behind. Slowly but surely the people affected are trying to pull their lives around, some more easily than others. The bridges being down are the most difficult thing to cope with but the snow and ice have added to the troubles.
As a club we have been overwhelmed by the generosity shown by our organisation nationwide. President Maureen has been contacted far and wide by individuals and presidents at every level who have all been so kind and caring in many different ways. The love and friendship shown to us has been wonderful.
But this letter is sent particularly to the Region of Northern England, to the clubs and to individual members who gave such generous amounts of money, particularly at the Regional Council Meeting. You have made such an amazing contribution to what was initially a very small pot of money that we wanted to donate to the flood fund.
We have not yet made our donation because we were aware that the Flood Fund was well stocked and as a club we met and decided that we would really like at least some of the money to go directly to women and children, mainly those who were particularly stranded on the North side of the river where getting to a school, a doctor or a shop was a major problem every day.
So to date we have made links with the Food-bank and the Churches together group who are targeting the worst affected cases. Some of our members have been able to work practically with these groups doing some very active programme action.
Two days before Christmas we were able to give a generous donation to a grandmother who shares her home (which was flooded) with her own 4year old, her adult daughter and her baby. They had lost everything in the flood and whilst her basic needs were being met there was absolutely nothing to make Christmas special. Our donation allowed her to make the difference and she was tearful and grateful that she could now replace her child’s bike which had been washed away. The little one could not sleep because of the horror of losing a special toy. – Yes in the scheme of things a bike is a luxury elsewhere but you cannot explain that to a child in the U.K. who has lost everything it hold’s dear.
We plan to meet again shortly to see where else we can help both practically and financially and we want you all in Northern England to know that your money will be used wisely..
President Maureen and all the members of S.I. Cockermouth and District have been shown how wonderful this organisation is and we send our love and thanks to each and every one of you.
In friendship
Doreen