The Jacksonville Kiwanis Club is turning a century old this week and has met an ambitious goal ahead of their birthday.
Luke Worrell says that through a huge push from their members over the last few weeks they have managed to exceed the goal of contributing to 100 causes, groups, or scholarships ahead of their 100th anniversary on Thursday.
Worrell says the group usually does contributions to 25-40 local groups annually but they wanted to go big for their anniversary this year: “The club did a great job. We typically reach around 30-40 groups annually. This was certainly an ambitious goal, but it was a group-wide effort. I’m ecstatic to say that from last September to this September, we’ve currently reached 105 [groups], so we even added 5 extra.
Worrell says that by July of this year the club had only reached about 34 groups because of being hampered by the pandemic; and fellow members ramped up efforts in just the last two months to reach the goal.
Worrell says the effort all goes back to the kids in the county: “From last September to this September, we have poured in over $65,000 into Morgan County, and specifically, the motto of Kiwanis is ‘To Serve the Children of the World.’ It’s pretty remarkable really that we’ve been able to pour in $65,000 to kids-centric, kids-based programming and protection here in Morgan County.”
The Kiwanis hope to celebrate the success of the 100 for 100 campaign at an upcoming banquet in November. More information about the banquet will be released at a later date.