The Kiwanis Club is hosting a fundraising event on Monday night from 4:30 to 7 p.m. at the Sunnyside Cafe in Williamston to finance its support of the community. 10% of the proceeds for the night plus gratuities will go toward the club.
“We give them 10% of sales, but we always round it up and there’s always a bucket out for gratuities and they take all of those. I’ve seen them raise like $700,” said Jeanette Ellsworth, owner of the Sunnyside Cafe.
Kiwanis members will serve the food, and Ellsworth said there will be a limited menu full of comfort foods.
Ellsworth said she “stole” the idea for the fundraiser from previous towns she had lived in, where local politicians, Boy Scouts, police chiefs and other community figures would become the servers at the restaurant to promote their events.
Kiwanis Club president, Teri Nelson, said the fundraiser will be a big help for their organization. “We’re just kind of struggling right now, and Jeanette always steps up, and she’s always there for us when we need it. That’s what I love about small-town little restaurants and little businesses; they’re always there for the community,” said Nelson.
“We’re a very family-oriented community. We’re here to take care of people, that’s just how we were raised,” said Ellsworth.
Madison Kort
Jeanette Ellsworth, owner of Sunnyside Cafe, Gwen Hulbert, Kiwanis treasurer and Teri Nelson, Kiwanis president discuss Monday’s Kiwanis fundraiser at the cafe.The main focus of Monday’s fundraiser is to raise money for the club’s general budget, so Kiwanis can keep contributing to the Williamston community. Large-scale projects have mostly been put on hold since the beginning of the pandemic to focus funds on direct community support.
Local support is essential to raising financial support for Kiwanis, said Nelson. “It’s places like Sunnyside that always step up and do things for us,” she said. “A lot of our businesses go above and beyond what they have to and help us with things like this.”
Kiwanis focuses on serving children and uplifting communities, according to its membership pamphlet. Nelson emphasized the importance of partnering with local businesses to meet the needs of kids and their families.
Madison Kort
The Kiwanis Club membership pamphlet provided by Nelson.“If the classrooms need things for the class, like tablets or anything that they need, we help them. If they want to go to camp in the summertime and their parents can’t afford to send them, we’re going to send them,” said Nelson. “Kids are kids, I don’t care who you are, I don’t care what you look like, I don’t care where you come from; if you need something I want to help you. So that’s what we’re all about.”
“We had some families that we were taking care of that had no money when that fiasco was going on and it was growing, and I started to get a little bit concerned,” Ellsworth said, referring to the first COVID-19 lockdown in 2020. There were kids who hadn’t eaten for two days in this town, and I said ‘Not in this town.’ This town is too small for that to be happening.”
“We quite often get all of these great letters of thank you from the kids, the kids write us letters all the time,” said Kiwanis Treasurer Gwen Hulbert. She maintains a scrapbook filled with thank-you notes, newspaper clippings, photographs and other mementos related to Kiwanis activities.
Madison Kort
Gwen Hulbert poses with the Kiwanis scrapbook that contains mementos of past projects and fundraisers, as well as thank you notes from the community.Kiwanis takes on a variety of projects, often requiring a large amount of funding. Nelson and Hulbert described some of the events that are made possible by fundraising events like the Sunnyside fundraiser. Members of the club read books to children, sew blankets and help host the Jubilee.
“One of the big things that I got Kiwanis involved in was, because I work for the police department, one of the officers and myself about 10 years ago started National Night Out. It goes on all over the nation, the first Tuesday of August. We started it here about 10 years ago. It’s free, everything is free.
“We didn’t want any family to have to pay for their kids to have a fun time once during the summer before they go back to school,” said Nelson.
However, COVID made events like National Night Out difficult over the past several years.
“We haven’t been able to because of everything, so we have the fire department and the police just get their vehicles, turn all the lights and sirens on, and we go through town through every neighborhood and hand out popsicles to all the kids,” said Nelson. “We don’t want them to think we forgot them just because of COVID. We are still here if you need us; that’s what we want to do.”
Local support is essential to raising financial support for Kiwanis, said Nelson. “It’s places like Sunnyside that always step up and do things for us,” she said. “A lot of our businesses go above and beyond what they have to and help us with things like this.”