Making Orange better one donation at a time

Rochelle Ashcroft, Jessie Blizzard, Riding for the Disabled’s Allan Everett, David Everett, Barbara Fenton, Robyn Livermore, Bob Fenton and Ty Mostyn of Veritas House.

Continuing their generous support for the Orange community Ashcroft’s IGA presented donations to two groups working to improve the lives of local kids.

Thanks to money raised from the IGA Community Chest program, $4000 was given to Riding for the Disabled Orange and another $4,500 to Veritas House.

“It is just amazing,” said Allan Everett, Treasurer of Riding for the Disabled Orange.

“Ashcroft’s are really generous with their donations and it allows us to keep operating. We use the money for various day to day things, but this particular donation will be used for some fences that need repair and to develop some more fencing.

COVID greatly restricted the activities of Riding for the Disabled in 2020, but the organisation is looking forward to a better 2022.

“COVID was a test for us, but fortunately we had the quality of people to be able to organise what we were required to do… Our AGM is on the 24th of February and then the kids will come back the next week and hopefully we'll be bigger and better than we are now!

“We've got some fabulous horses and wonderful kids and the volunteers are just amazing... but you know we could do with more volunteers. It is such a worthwhile cause and there is a real satisfaction in walking away after a day with the kids and seeing the smiles on their faces.”

Despite COVID restriction putting a halt on a number of fundraising activities for Ashcroft’s in-house charity Let’s Make Better, Rochelle Ashcroft said they actually raised more money in 2020 than previous years thanks to some generous donations,

“That was nice to see,” said Rochelle. “And I think it was good because we could give out more money in a tough year.”