ELYRIA – The East Elyria Kiwanis Club is disbanding and emptying its coffers into a special endowment fund to help Elyria children.

The East Elyria Kiwanis Endowment Fund will be a permanent way for group members to ensure their purpose can be fulfilled long after the club is gone. It will be managed by the Community Foundation of Lorain County and will annually award grants to three Elyria entities that all work in some way to educate children.

The grants will go to Elyria Public Library for educational material for children, Lorain County Historical Society for programming directed toward the youth of Elyria and to the Elyria Public Schools Endowment for classroom grants that benefit students at the elementary school level.

“The fund will operate into perpetuity depending on how well the market does,” said Margo Hirth, advancement officer with Community Foundation.

Each year the total award to be given will be divided equally among the three groups.

“We are going to deplete the treasury, and it will all go to charitable causes,” said Andrew Allan, a longtime member and past president. “That has always been our plan. We raise money selling pies and pancakes, but in the end it will all go to the kids.”

Current president William Custar said the club has working directly with the Historical Society and indirectly with the Elyria Schools. In doing so, club members learned that each are having a huge positive impact on the youth of Elyria.

“We feel very strongly about the three organizations we have decided to give the money to,” he said.

The club started more than 50 years ago as an outlet for Elyrians who wanted to get involved in community service. Soon afterward, the core mission of the group was streamlined to improving the quality of life for children and families in the city.

The group’s past projects include helping the Elyria City Health District provide medicine for children, providing hats and gloves for underprivileged school children and giving academic scholarships to Elyria High School students.

Over the years, however, the size of the group has dwindled. Now, just seven members remain.

“We had a great time and it was a great ride, but we can’t go on anymore,” Allan said. “We are not growing and can’t get any more members.”

Contact Lisa Roberson at 329-7121 or lroberson@chroniclet.com.

---

Print this story
Report an inappropriate comment

---

In order to comment, you must agree to our user agreement and discussion guidelines.

Need help? Email Us.

---