A newly formed community group in Niagara-on-the-Lake is bringing women together to pool their donations and support local charities.
A new 100 Women Who Care chapter in NOTL, co-founded by Julia Buxton-Cox, Penny Milligan and Audrey Pellett, held its first meeting Wednesday night.
The model, founded by Karen Dunigan of Michigan in 2006, brings together women in a community who each donate $100 multiple times a year.
At each meeting, members nominate charities, hear short presentations and vote on where the total donation will go, creating a single, large gift with immediate local benefit.
“To have the impact of $10,000 would just be life-changing for a lot of these organizations that rely on, you know, a shoestring budget,” Pellett said in an interview.
The group has already surpassed its goal of 100 members, meaning the first donation will be even larger — over $14,000.
Each member must live in NOTL and commit to donating $100 quarterly, with meetings held in October, January, April and July.
“Members are able to nominate charities. It is an open-nomination period,” said Pellett.
After collecting nominations, three members’ charities are drawn, at random, by Buxton-Cox and herself. Milligan then reviews each one to confirm the organization is a registered Canadian charity — “one of the requirements that we have,” Pellett added.
The three members whose charities were selected then present short pitches and the group then votes to decide the recipient.
“It goes directly to the charity,” said Pellett. “We’re not depositing $10,000 into a bank account and then turning around writing a check for $10,000.”
She said the idea “intrigued all of us, I think, separately.”
Milligan was a founding member of the Saint John, N.B., chapter and was already familiar with the model, while Pellett’s sister is involved with the Cambridge group.
“We were just chatting one day and we said, ‘Well, let’s let’s do this.’ And we’ve done it,” Pellett said.
Milligan provided “a wealth of knowledge” from her experience, Pellett said. “It’s actually been really, really beneficial.”
She said the system helps ensure fairness and transparency, since members will not know which charities have been drawn until the meeting.
“It also stops people from joining that have an allegiance to that organization,” she added.
The selected charity must return at the following meeting to explain how the funds were used.
This time, that will be in January.
“Just a five, 10-minute speech,” said Pellett — “an opportunity for our members to actually see, ‘Look, this is what happened.’”
Buxton-Cox said the experience has shown her the strength of local women when they unite behind a common goal.
“I’m so proud of how quickly this group has come together and how eager everyone is to give back,” she told The Lake Report.
“What I love most is how connected everyone feels — not only to each other, but to the causes we’re supporting.”
The initiative is traditionally women-led. “We have just decided to go along with that,” Pellett said.
However, men interested in starting a similar group should “build a 100 Men Who Care,” she said. Collaborations between the two “would be a discussion for the future,” she added.
This first meeting will set the tone for how the group grows, Pellett said. “We will say, ‘What went well, what didn’t go well?’”
The three nominees are selected for Wednesday and sign-ups remain open. New members weren’t able attend this week’s meeting in person, due to space restrictions at the venue, though their $100 was accepted “with heartfelt gratitude, Pellett added.
There are no plans to cap membership unless attendance outgrows space normally available in town.
The group isn’t limiting its support to any specific cause or sector.
“These days, everyone has need,” Pellett said.
