POND ISLAND--A handful of youngsters ages 12 and under have helped bring 19 wheel-chairs to St. Maarten. The children from the Little League’s Player Development programme teamed up with Rotary to collect the tops off soda cans.
The metal tops are sent north for recycling and the money raised is used for the chairs.
Player Development held a special thank you and award ceremony at the Little League field recently. The children wanted to thank the Rotary for allowing them to help people in need.
“It’s really nice to help people,” said five-year old Cory.
Player Development presented the Rotarians eight pounds of tops for transport. Rotary Mid-Isle added an additional 32 pounds to the tally making the collection approximately 50,000 tops toward the next batch of chairs.
The programme started back in 2015 when Rotary Coaches from Canada visited Player Development and spoke about collecting Pop Tops to help people in need. The children liked the idea and it was agreed the Children would collect the Tops and visiting Canadian Rotarians would carry the tops to Canada for recycling.
The programme started slow, with the children just collecting tops from cans on their walk to the field and at home.
One player did the math and at the current rate of collection it was calculated it would take about 100 years to collect enough tops for one chair.
Next the children decided to make collection cans and place them at local eaters... Unfortunately, local for eight to 12-year olds barely reached Philipsburg.
The children wanted to spread the cans all over the island. So, they decided to ask for help. Mid-Isle Rotary visited the children once a month on a Saturday. The Rotarians would read with the children and sometimes if the work was done fast they would play ball too.
Mid Isle was asked to assist and they did. Not only did they spread collection cans around the island, their members started collecting too.
To date the group with help from Avantika, Buffalo Wings, Pineapple Pete, Wasabi Charlie, Vesna, Lal'a, The Palms, Maya Indian Restaurant, Vensa Taverna, Chesterfields, Zoo Rock Café, Bombay Bites, Buccaneer Beach Bar and Carl and Sons have helped distribute 19 wheel-chairs on St. Maarten.
Player Development honoured Lezlie Murch from St. Catharines Rotary in Canada for starting the programme, Denise Antrobus, the coordinator of the Pop Top programme for Mid Isle and Anjali Manek the president of the Rotary Club.
