With its traditional inspirational moments, the emotion-filled
Relay for Life wrapped up its third 24-hour event Sunday morning
with $150,000 raised for the American Cancer Society.
“It was just great,” said Chris Schilling, one of the event’s
organizers. “If I could carbon copy it for next year, I’d be real
happy.”
With its traditional inspirational moments, the emotion-filled Relay for Life wrapped up its third 24-hour event Sunday morning with $150,000 raised for the American Cancer Society.
“It was just great,” said Chris Schilling, one of the event’s organizers. “If I could carbon copy it for next year, I’d be real happy.”
More money will continue to come in Schilling said, and corporate matching funds of at least $10,000 are expected.
“I was in the grocery store today, and one team member came up and told me they have an additional $2,000,” she said Monday.
The weather was definitely an improvement over last year, when downpours forced the cancellation of some of the bands scheduled to perform and sent walkers indoors to their team tents when they weren’t on the track. Mostly sunny skies and mild temperatures encouraged people to stay at the event and brought visitors who weren’t on teams out to the site to be a part of the fun.
There were 45 official teams participating this year, Schilling said, and others arrived at the last minute. Participants and community members purchased at least 2,700 luminaria for the Saturday evening ceremony, complete with lighting ceremony and a bagpiper.
The fundraiser was held at Oakwood Country School on John Wilson Way this year.
Organizers were pleased with the new venue; the event was held at Community Park last year and in 2002, its inaugural year.
“Oakwood was a more intimate setting,” public relations chair Becky Oddema said Monday. “It was difficult, with the Community Park set up, to keep people informed about what was going on. The main stage was so far from the hospitality tent and the other tents. At Oakwood, we had a much better layout.”
Schilling agreed, and said the Oakwood staff was wonderful to work with.
“Not only did they not charge us for using the site, they saved us $500 in furniture rental,” she said. “We were walking the grounds with Ted (school owner Helvey), and he said, ‘We have all these tables and chairs, would that help you?’ And when we were concerned about traffic and parking, Ted said he would call the owner of the field in front of the school to see if we could use it.”
The owner agreed, Schilling said, but the grass and weeds were several feet tall.
“Ted said, ‘Let me call Don Trinchero,’ of Trinchero Construction and ask if he would disc the field for us,” she said.
Schilling said she was very grateful because not only did Trinchero disc the field, but scraped it, because the dirt was too deep, then decided it needed to be watered down, because of the dust.
“He really saved the event for us,” she said. “It was a last-minute thing, but he did such a professional job. We had no parking issues, and it was so convenient.”
Another last minute hurdle was cleared when Oakwood PE teacher Penny Ciraulo used her flatbed and four-wheel ATV to become the trash lady.
“She jumped right in and got to work,” Schilling said. “We didn’t even know she’d be at the event, but she knew about our problem with getting a golf cart or something to run around and haul trash in, and she just came and did it.”
This spirit of pitching in to make it work, said Schilling, is something organizers see from the whole Morgan Hill community.
“Look at all the people who help,” she said. “We have donations of food, donations of items, donations of time and many individual donations.”
Local businesses supporting the Relay for Life include Rosy’s at the Beach, House of Bagels, Mama Mia’s, Sweet Retreat, Baskin Robbins, Safeway, Nob Hill Foods, Jamba Juice, Ina Bina, Tennant Station Stadium Theaters, Piercy Toyota and Design Factory Graphics.
Marilyn Dubil covers education and law enforcement for The Times. She can be reached by e-mail at
md****@mo*************.com
or phoning (408) 779-4106 Ext. 202
