Holiday Fantasy again brings in big dollars for hospital
Published 4:12 pm Thursday, April 30, 2009
By Brenda Sexton, The Courier-Herald
It must be a special night when the big-ticket item at Enumclaw Community Hospital Foundation's annual fund-raising auction is a generator.
Despite still recovering from the ravages of a wind storm that blew through town Wednesday and Thursday, ECH Foundation leaders rallied the troops and pulled off another successful Holiday Fantasy Dinner and Auction Friday night at Emerald Downs.
The Honda EB 11000 with a 20 horsepower electric start engine, was a hot item among bidders, generating a lot of interest and eventually a $3,500 closing bid.
Cecilia Gaynor, who co-chaired the event with Bill Marcum, said they were pleased with both turnout and donations. She suspects the storm kept away about two dozen patrons, but those in attendance still managed to dig deep into their pockets and raise about $90,000 for Enumclaw Community Hospital.
"A huge thank you to all those who contributed. It's amazing how generous everyone was," Gaynor said. "We are so lucky to live in a community that really cares about its hospital."
Gaynor said the weather definitely contributed to the generator's popularity, but she thinks it also played a hand in the interest of a wood stove and several trips to warmer climates like Cabo San Lucas and Beverly Hills.
Although trips to colder climates like an Alaska Cruise, a ski vacation in Big Sky, Mont., and a snowmobile weekend in Cle Elum were also hits.
A need for speed also opened wallets.
A weekend NASCAR getaway in Phoenix that included rental car, resort stay, tickets to the race and a photo opportunity with Enumclaw Nextel Cup and Busch Series driver Kasey Kahne went for $2,500. As an added bonus, the (autographed) driver's suit Kahne wore when he recently won his first NASCAR Busch Series race sold for $1,100.
An opportunity to be a fighter pilot for a day, in the real thing, sold three times for $1,300 a pop.
Foundation members like Gaynor and Marcum were extremely grateful to those on hand who donated cash on the spot to its Fund-an-Item campaign to purchase a ventilator for the hospital. Organizers were hoping to raise between $16,000 and $20,000 for the item. Donations came in at $22,800.
The Foundation has been hosting the Holiday Fantasy for 13 years. Just in the past three years, the Foundation has provided the hospital with care-van donations, a nursery infant warmer, surgical orthopedic instruments, ultrasound equipment, cardiac ultrasound equipment, a new care van, anesthesia chair, two laryngoscopes, surgery patient recovery monitor, heart rate and pulse oximeter, hematology analyzer for laboratory and newborn hearing testing equipment.
Gaynor said the Foundation can't put on the event without its 40 or more volunteers including the high school honor students, Mutual of Enumclaw who loans the Foundation computer experts and Mt. Rainier National Bank, which supplies volunteers to take care of deposits and donations.
Brenda Sexton can be reached at bsexton@cmg-northwest2.go-vip.net/courierherald
