Year's summary

A YEAR WITH ROTARY – ESPECIALLY IN THE COMMUNITY

The end of June marks the end of our Rotary year – a time to look back on what we have done and to frame our plans for the coming year.

In 2023/24 we have supported Rotary’s international work but we see supporting our local community as our first priority.

Internationally we have made a significant contribution to aid for Gaza and the earthquakes in Turkey, Morocco and Libya, principally through the funding of Shelterboxes, which provide tents and living essentials for displaced families; we have continued, of course to support the Ukrainian people both in Ukraine and here in our local community; and we maintain our commitment to Rotary’s End Polio Now, which since its creation in 1987 has helped reduce the number of wild polio cases by 99% to just two countries, Afghanistan and Pakistan, with only three cases recorded in each country in March 2024. We do this and more.

But our priority is what we do at home.

We see ourselves as an integral part of our local community and we are committed to supporting the people and the clubs, organisations and institutions in our community. Increasingly, too, we work to protect and improve our local environment.

In the past year we have supported the two local food banks – Community for Food and the Wester Hailes Holy Trinity Food Bank – both financially and practically – and at Holy Trinity volunteering to help with the preparation and cooking of meals.

We organized a Primary Schools Quiz competition, which was won by Ratho Primary School, who went on to win at the Edinburgh Area level and came 4^th out of 16 schools competing at District level. In addition, we have supportedlocal youngsters through our Youth Grants scheme as well as helping finance a school initiative to assist disadvantaged pupils.

We continue to work with Balerno Village Trust in funding and administering the Pentland Community Chest, which provides grants to local clubs and organisations of up to £600 towards projects of value to the community. Awards have been made this year to more than 20 beneficiaries, including charities, schools, sports clubs and community institutions.

And, we are pleased to have made a big contribution to our local environment, including maintaining the plants at Currie.

Earlier in 2023, we worked with Pentlands Eco Network to plant 25 fruit trees in Currie’s George V Park and we have followed this up more recently with 12 cherry trees, provided by Edinburgh City Council. We are now committed to the maintenance of these trees, as we are to the maintenance of the Currie flowers, which we established in 2002.

We were also involved with other Edinburgh Rotary Clubs, in arranging, alongside the Water of Leith Conservation Trust, “the mother of all Community Spring Clear-ups” along the banks of the Water of Leith – a lot achieved but a lot more to be done!   

We congratulate President John Wilson, pictured here, on a very successful year. John hands over the baton to his successor, Ian Campbell, who takes over on 1 July. We look forward to another good year with Ian.