The report from the Northumberland Hills Hospital Auxiliary at October's hospital board meeting offered a good analysis of the organization's membership challenges.
These challenges have not curbed the support the auxiliary has shown in its fundraising efforts toward the hospital's new Clinical Information System (and in meeting its pledge of $1-million).
“In the meantime, we have been opening slowly but surely,” she said
This includes their presence in the hospital as volunteers as well as their fundraising, President Selena Forsyth said.
Their Little Treasure Shoppe gift shop is open in the hospital lobby, and their Petticoat Lane thrift shop is doing particularly well at raising money for the hospital since it reopened in mid-July.
All this good work means the auxiliary bank balance stands at $79,000.
But a lot of the Petticoat Lane volunteers are not coming back, Forsyth said, “because they are concerned because we are dealing with the general public, and that sometimes is difficult. And, of course, we have no proof as to whether or not the people who come into the store are vaccinated.”
As for the volunteers at the hospital, many of them are aging. Some are dying. This comes at a time when recruitment for many organizations is difficult. Fortunately, she said, the hospital has hired a volunteer manager whose duties include recruiting new volunteers. And the auxiliary is restructuring its organization.
More good news comes about the number of auxiliary members who do not have internet and cannot get e-mail. This is down to 28 from 80 a year ago.